Staff Backend Engineer

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About Zello

Zello is a voice-first communication platform, powered by our industry-leading push-to-talk technology, to improve collaboration and productivity for desk-less workers. With over 175+ million users, we’re the #1 rated push-to-talk app in the world, delivering 9 billion (yes, with a B) messages a month.

At Zello, our company values are at the heart of what we do everyday. We’re proud to serve the frontline, we’re privileged to connect people in times of crisis across the globe, and we’re honored to support first responders.

And this is where you come in.

We're looking for a skilled staff-level software engineer specializing in the backend of enterprise-level applications and platforms. Your passion and expertise will directly contribute to our success, and as a team mentor, we value your ability to coordinate your efforts and those of others.

At Zello, you'll find a talented, responsible, and caring team excited to learn. We believe in fostering a supportive and collaborative work environment where everyone's contributions are valued. We have fun building software at the heart of mission-critical work in various industries and public service sectors. We value simplicity, excellence, and a focus on getting things done.

This position is based in Austin and reports to the Engineering Manager for our Core Team.

In your first year, you will successfully...

• Design and implement improvements toward a scalable and reliable backend service-oriented architecture.
• Work with the Core application team to plan, build, and execute various projects on time and within budget.
• Support the platform engineering team in building and deploying scalable services, RESTful APIs, and systems.

What you'll do

• Act as a mentor to fellow developers, sharing knowledge and contributing to the team’s continuous improvement and growth.
• Collaborating with the Core application team by contributing to the backend technology strategy and execution.
• Provide architecture and technical leadership and leverage cutting-edge technologies to improve backend services continuously.
• Evaluate and evolve engineering processes for the team.
• Design, code, and troubleshoot new features while debugging as necessary.
• Write clean code to develop functional backend applications.
• Manage tools and processes for handling analytics data and metrics that measure and evaluate the quality of services deployed.
• Work with the platform engineering team to deliver scalable and reliable backend services.
• Support the architecture migration roadmap and execution plan to scale Zello’s backend infrastructure.

Who you are

• BSc in Computer Science or equivalent experience.
• At least ten years of working experience as a software engineer.
• Ample knowledge and expertise in cloud-native architecture design and implementation.
• Extensive experience in C++, Go, Linux, distributed systems, microservices architecture, cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP), and RESTful APIs.
• Deep system design and architecture experience, defining patterns and best practices for others to follow.
• A solid sense of ownership with the ability to own technical roadmaps and refine ambiguous problems.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate with other engineers and cross-functional partners to create the best products.
• You understand how to build scalable web applications.
• You have a problem-solving attitude and flexible mindset, are conscientious, good-natured, and enjoy interacting with people.
• Superior written and verbal communication skills and a collaborative team spirit.

Even better if you have…

• A DevOps experience/mindset.
• Additional experience with NodeJS, MongoDB, and Elasticsearch.
• Experience designing, building, and maintaining a production system at scale.
• Experience evaluating and implementing improvements to established processes and technologies while staying ahead of industry trends and best practices.

#LI-Hybrid

We hire for potential, passion for our mission, and a knack for solving difficult problems over checking every qualification box. We have competitive pay, equity with significant upside, and intentionally design our benefits to encourage healthy and well-balanced employees, from flexible work schedules to unlimited paid time off. We even offer a sabbatical after every five years of service so you’re able to pursue and enjoy what matters most to you. And of course, we wouldn’t be a technology company in Austin without a ping-pong table and free snacks in our break room. Join us!

Zello provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.