Staff Backend Software Engineer
Posted Updated
Description
- Kargo’s systems move fast and operate at scale — this role exists to make sure they hold up under both
- The Staff Software Engineer owns technical direction across backend services and shared platform capabilities, translating ambiguous business needs into durable architecture and reliable execution
- Without this role, complexity compounds silently and engineering teams lose the leverage they need to ship with confidence
- Outcomes — What Success Looks Like in 6–12 Months:
- Architecture is driving alignment, not slowing it down. Service boundaries, interfaces, and design patterns are clearly defined across multiple systems, and teams reference shared standards rather than solving the same problems independently
- Major initiatives ship with operational integrity. At least one cross-team technical initiative moves from discovery through production rollout with strong observability, documented tradeoffs, and a clean post-launch record
- Platform health is measurably improved. Structural weaknesses are identified and addressed — whether through targeted refactors, new reference implementations, or infrastructure investments — and the impact is visible in reliability or performance metrics
- Engineering effectiveness goes up across teams. Tooling improvements, testing strategy, and documentation contributions reduce friction in the development cycle, and other engineers can point to concrete ways this role made their work easier
- Senior engineers are growing into broader ownership. At least two engineers have expanded their scope or technical influence, with this role serving as a deliberate catalyst for that growth
- Deep proficiency in Go (or comparable systems/compiled language) with production experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems
- Operational instincts across monitoring, debugging, incident response, and systemic follow-through
- Hands-on experience with Docker, Kubernetes, and AWS in production environments
- Demonstrated ability to lead complex, cross-team technical initiatives from problem definition through production rollout
- Strong systems design fundamentals: APIs, service architecture, concurrency, data modeling, fault tolerance, and performance
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain technical tradeoffs to non-technical stakeholders
- Knows when to move fast, when to invest, and when to hold — and can articulate the reasoning to engineers and stakeholders alike
- Identifies systemic risk early and makes sound calls on whether to patch, refactor, or redesign
- Actively invests in the development of senior engineers, helping them take on broader technical ownership and influence
- Establishes reusable patterns and reference implementations that other engineers actually adopt because they’re genuinely useful
- Stays close enough to the code to lead by example and make high-leverage contributions when it counts
- Leads design reviews and technical discussions that bring teams to strong decisions without relying on formal authority or slowing down momentum
- Treats observability, incident management, and post-launch iteration as first-class parts of the engineering process, not afterthoughts
- Takes loosely defined product or business problems and produces clear, actionable technical plans without waiting for full clarity
- Competencies — Behaviors We Like to See:
- Translates Ambiguity Into Direction:
- Raises the Bar Without Holding Court:
- Operates With Production Discipline:
- Grows the People Around Them:
- Familiarity with RTB, SSP, or auction systems — or other performance-sensitive distributed platforms where latency, throughput, and cost must be actively balanced
- Experience building shared internal platforms or frameworks adopted across multiple engineering teams