Lead/Staff Backend Engineer, Payments Platform
Xero
full-time
Posted on:
Location Type: Remote
Location: Remote • California • 🇺🇸 United States
Visit company websiteSalary
💰 $206,000 - $257,400 per year
Job Level
Senior
Tech Stack
AWSCloudDistributed SystemsGoJavaNoSQLSQL
About the role
- Define and build core platform services: Lead the design and development of reliable, scalable, performant, and secure services for Xero’s Payments Platform.
- Architect the future of payments: Shape the technical foundation for Xero’s money movement capabilities while unlocking new product lines.
- Stay hands-on: Contribute directly to production code, proof-of-concepts, and technical deep dives.
- Solve complex problems: Tackle challenging fintech and distributed systems problems with innovative solutions.
- Drive technical excellence: Set a high bar for reliability, security, and scale through design reviews, mentoring, and best practices.
- Collaborate cross-functionally: Partner with Product, Security, Risk, and Operations teams to translate complex business needs into resilient engineering solutions.
- Mentor and grow engineers: Act as a role model, coach, and technical leader, fostering a culture of inclusion, collaboration, and excellence.
- Ensure operational excellence: Lead on-call practices, build robust observability, and champion high-performance, reliable systems.
- Drive innovation: Encourage experimentation and adoption of new technologies, staying ahead of industry trends to strengthen our platform.
Requirements
- 8+ Years of software engineering experience, with a proven track record as a Staff / Technical Lead delivering highly available, distributed backend systems at scale.
- Deep expertise in system architecture, API design, and building high-throughput, reliable services—understanding how to design under the constraints of both new and existing systems.
- Strong proficiency in at least one modern backend stack (e.g. C# a bonus, Java, Golang, C++) and experience with cloud-native platforms (AWS a bonus).
- Experience with both SQL and NoSQL databases.
- Demonstrated leadership in setting technical direction, solving complex problems, and mentoring senior and junior engineers.
- Experience in payments, fintech, or other highly regulated, compliance-heavy domains (preferred but not required).
- Strong collaboration and communication skills, with the ability to work effectively across engineering, product, and operations.
- Proven ability to break down complex problems into clear, actionable solutions and drive agile execution.
- Experience auditing codebases to uphold high standards for security, testability, and maintainability, with the ability to set and guide code design decisions.
Benefits
- Generous paid leave
- Statutory holidays
- Dedicated paid leave for physical and mental wellbeing
- Employee Assistance Program for mental health care
- Employee resource groups
- Wellbeing programming and allowances
- Medical, dental, vision, and disability insurance
- Fertility and family forming financial support
- 401k contribution matching
- 26 weeks of paid parental leave for primary caregivers
- Employee Share Plan
- Beautiful offices with snacks and break areas
- Flexible working
- Career development
Applicant Tracking System Keywords
Tip: use these terms in your resume and cover letter to boost ATS matches.
Hard skills
system architectureAPI designbackend developmentC#JavaGolangC++SQLNoSQLcloud-native platforms
Soft skills
leadershipmentoringcollaborationcommunicationproblem-solvingtechnical directionagile executioninclusioncoachinginnovation