Staff Backend Software Engineer, Revenue Engine

Headway

Staff backend engineer shaping payment and claims infrastructure for Headway’s mental healthcare platform. Leading distributed-systems reliability, integrations, technical standards, and engineering mentorship at scale.

Posted 8/7/2026full-timeRemote • California, New York, Washington • 🇺🇸 United StatesLead💰 $264,000 - $330,000 per yearWebsite

Core Competencies

Role fit

Core Competencies

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Demonstrates expertise in backend and distributed systems engineering, with a focus on designing fault-tolerant integrations and optimizing for maintainability and scale. Capable of mentoring senior engineers and effectively communicating across teams in complex healthcare and regulatory environments.

Highest-signal resume keywords

Technical LeadershipFault-Tolerant Integration DesignConcurrency and Idempotency ExpertiseMentorship and Code ReviewAPI Architecture and Frontend State Management

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills

Backend EngineeringDistributed Systems EngineeringConcurrencyIdempotencyFault-Tolerant DesignOperational AutomationCode GenerationSoftware DevelopmentTechnical Decision MakingProblem Solving

Soft Skills

Precise CommunicationMentoringCollaborationTeaching

Tools & Technologies

TypeScriptPython 3ReactRemixNext.jsFastAPISQLAlchemyPostgresRedisAWS

Industry Keywords

Payment SystemsHealthcarePayerRegulatory ComplianceOperational Excellence

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

AWSDistributed SystemsJavaScriptKafkaNext.jsPostgresPythonReactRedisSwitchingTypeScript

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Set technical direction across the Payment Platform and Clearinghouse Platform teams
Partner with engineering leadership on foundational platform decisions for moving money between patients, providers, and payers
Lead the design of fault-tolerant, observable, and deeply reconciled integrations with Stripe, Plaid, and payer clearinghouses
Build abstractions and standards for adjacent engineering teams, including Billing Infrastructure, Patient Billing, and Provider Payouts
Write code where leverage is highest
Mentor senior engineers across both pods
Shape operational excellence, reliability, throughput, and correctness of payment and claims systems
Address distributed-systems challenges involving concurrency, idempotency, and partial failures
Participate in technical and non-technical interviews as part of the hiring process

Requirements

What you’ll need

Hands-on technical leadership in backend and distributed systems engineering
Ability to design fault-tolerant, observable, and deeply reconciled integrations
Experience with concurrency, idempotency, and partial-failure problems
Ability to make technical decisions optimizing for maintainability and scale
Experience turning ambiguous problems into shipped software
Ability to mentor senior engineers and teach through code reviews and design discussions
Ability to learn complex healthcare, payer, regulatory, and exception-driven domains quickly
Precise and concise communication across Slack, design documents, and cross-team meetings
Experience applying LLMs to code generation, operational automation, or developer tooling
Backend/frontend context switching, including API architecture and frontend state management
Familiarity with TypeScript, Python 3, React, Remix, Next.js, FastAPI, SQLAlchemy, Postgres, Redis, Snowflake, AWS, Temporal, Kafka, Datadog, Sentry, PagerDuty, Cursor, Claude, Gemini, and Eddy
Must be located in the NYC, SF, or Seattle regions
Must be authorized to work in the United States for any employer

Benefits

Comp & perks

Competitive equity package
Medical insurance
Dental insurance
Vision insurance
HSA/FSA
401(k)
Carrot Fertility reimbursement
16-week parental leave
Therapy reimbursement
Professional development budget
13 holidays
A full week off in December
Flexible PTO
Optional in-office time at offices in NYC, SF, and Seattle