Staff Software Engineer, Backend – Marketplace/App Experience

Affirm

Staff Software Engineer focused on backend development in Affirm's Marketplace and App Experience. Leading technical strategy and fostering a culture of quality and innovation within a highly collaborative engineering team.

Posted 7/22/2026full-timeRemote • California, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Washington • 🇺🇸 United StatesLead💰 $204,000 - $290,000 per yearWebsite

Core Competencies

Role fit

Core Competencies

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Demonstrates expertise in designing and developing backend systems at scale, with a strong focus on technical strategy, operational processes, and team leadership. Proficient in fostering a culture of quality and ownership while ensuring system availability and effective collaboration across teams.

Highest-signal resume keywords

Backend System DesignDistributed Systems DevelopmentAWS Cloud TechnologiesPython or Kotlin ProgrammingUI Frameworks like React

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills

Backend System DesignDistributed Systems DevelopmentPython ProgrammingKotlin ProgrammingAWS TechnologiesMySQL DatabaseSpark FrameworkKubernetesUI DevelopmentSearch and Recommendation Engines

Soft Skills

Strong Verbal CommunicationStrong Written CommunicationTeam LeadershipMentoringCollaboration

Tools & Technologies

AWSMySQLSparkKubernetesReact

Certifications & Qualifications

Bachelor’s Degree in Related Field

Industry Keywords

Technical StrategyOperational ProcessesCode Review StandardsDesign StandardsTechnical Solutions

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

AWSDistributed SystemsKotlinKubernetesMySQLPythonReactSpark

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Responsible for setting technical strategy for your team on a year-long time scale and help your team tie it together with critical, business-impacting projects.
Collaborate across teams in the product development lifecycle to ensure technical sustainability, risks and trade-offs are well understood and managed.
Act as a force-multiplier for your team through definition and advocacy of technical solutions and operational processes.
Take ownership of your team’s operations and availability by ensuring you have the right monitoring, triage rotations, playbooks, policies, testing and alerting in place to support “keep the lights on” & on-call efforts.
Foster a culture of quality and ownership on your team by setting code review and design standards and advocating for them beyond your team through writing and tech talks.
Help develop talent on your team by providing feedback and guidance, and leading by example.

Requirements

What you’ll need

8+ years of experience designing, developing and launching backend systems at scale using languages like Python or Kotlin.
Extensive track record of developing highly available distributed systems using technologies like AWS, MySQL, Spark and Kubernetes.
Experience developing consumer experiences using UI frameworks like React
2+ years of experience working in search or related recommendation engines
Experience delivering major features, system components or deprecating existing functionality in a system through the definition of a technical and execution plan. You write high quality code that is easily understood and used by others.
Thrive in ambiguity, and are comfortable moving from low level language idioms all the way to the architecture of large systems.
Strong verbal and written communication skills that support effective collaboration with our global engineering team.
This position requires either equivalent practical experience or a Bachelor’s degree in a related field.

Benefits

Comp & perks

Health care coverage - Affirm covers all premiums for all levels of coverage for you and your dependents
Flexible Spending Wallets - generous stipends for spending on Technology, Food, various Lifestyle needs, and family forming expenses
Time off - competitive vacation and holiday schedules allowing you to take time off to rest and recharge
ESPP - An employee stock purchase plan enabling you to buy shares of Affirm at a discount