Senior Backend Engineer

About the role

This role designs and operates backend systems end-to-end, from low-level storage to customer APIs. Success is measured by correctness, performance, and sustainable incident resolution.

Software engineers turn product ideas into working code. Engineers work in small teams, review each other's work, and ship in small batches. Most teams follow agile practices such as sprints and daily standups. Engineers also write tests, fix bugs, and improve performance. The field values clear communication as much as technical skill. Engineers spend part of every week on planning, code review, and debugging, not just writing new code. The ability to explain a technical decision in plain words separates strong engineers from the rest.

Key facts

What you'll do

Purpose-built database capabilities are advanced through contributions that align the store with demanding platform requirements from the ground up.

Platform primitives such as data access patterns, authorization rules, and orchestration logic are constructed and refined to ensure long-term stability.

Reliability is sustained through design reviews, capacity forecasts, incident responses, and a rotating on-call schedule shared across the team.

Performance regressions are identified and fixed across the stack, while engineers mentor peers and influence long-term technical direction.

Requirements

Five or more years of software engineering experience are required, with Rust as a strong preference, while exceptional systems engineers from other backgrounds are welcome.

Experience delivering APIs, services, storage engines, query engines, or data-intensive backends is expected.

Distributed systems principles, including consistency, fault tolerance, replication, and observability, must be demonstrated in practice.

API design and deployment history that shows attention to correctness and contract stability is necessary.

Strong fundamentals are required, with care for correctness, test coverage, and well-designed abstractions.

Nice to have

Backgrounds in query planning or optimization, multi-tenant platforms or authorization, C or C++ familiarity, or open-source contributions are valued.

Practical notes

This position is based in an office in Vienna, VA, and requires US work authorization. The team works in-person because that is how trust is built and hard problems are tackled together.

Typical interview steps

Hiring for engineering roles usually starts with a recruiter screen, followed by one or two technical rounds. Candidates often solve a coding problem, discuss past projects, and answer system design questions. Some loops include a take-home task. Final rounds typically cover team fit and give candidates a chance to ask questions. Interviewers look for how you break down an unfamiliar problem, not just whether you reach the answer. Practicing a few problems aloud and reviewing your own past projects are the best preparation.

Good to know

Engineers work close to the metal with systems design, performance, and storage efficiency. The role emphasizes correctness, rigorous testing, and maintainable abstractions. Deterministic simulations are used to find elusive bugs and rely on backend infrastructure to power that mission.

Questions to ask

Worth asking in any interview: how the team measures success, who the role works with daily, what the onboarding looks like, and what the company is trying to achieve this year. Asking what past hires did well is a strong final question. Keep the list short and pick the questions that matter most to you.

Career growth

Engineering careers usually progress from individual contributor to senior, staff, and principal levels. Some engineers move into management and lead teams of five to twenty people. Others stay on the technical track. Growth follows demonstrated impact, not tenure alone. A typical engineering ladder has clear levels with defined expectations for scope, quality, and mentorship. Moving up usually requires owning outcomes end to end rather than completing assigned tickets.