Senior/Staff Backend Engineer (SDE-4)
100% Remote (EST)
6 months +
Location Requirement: Flexible (Remote open across U.S. time zones)
Overview
Client is hiring for two backend engineering roles: a Senior Back End Engineer IV (SDE IV) and a Back End Engineer III (SDE III) to support a growing product initiative within the 10-4 platform.
This is a backend focused engineering role supporting a consumer facing mobile application, representing one of client s first B2C initiatives. While the platform includes payment capabilities, the broader focus is on building scalable backend services that support mobile experiences, including location services, APIs, and microservices architecture.
These are high impact individual contributor roles. The team is not looking for managers or leads, but rather strong engineers who can come in, operate autonomously, and execute with minimal oversight. Candidates must be able to understand existing systems, contribute to feature development, and work through engineering backlogs efficiently.
A key differentiator for this team is a strong emphasis on intellectual rigor, authenticity, and problem-solving ability. The interview process is designed to assess real world thinking, not memorized or AI assisted responses. Candidates are expected to demonstrate their own reasoning, approach, and coding ability during live technical evaluations.
Top Required Skills
- Strong Backend Development (Java Focus): Proficiency in Java is the primary requirement, with the ability to build and maintain backend services and APIs.
- Python (Supporting Skill): Working knowledge of Python for backend services or supporting systems.
- Microservices Architecture: Experience designing and building scalable, distributed backend systems and services.
- AWS Cloud Experience: Familiarity with deploying and running applications in AWS environments.
- PostgreSQL / Relational Databases: Experience working with PostgreSQL or similar relational databases.
- Problem Solving & Coding Ability: Strong algorithmic thinking and ability to write clean, functional code during live coding exercises.
- System Design (Senior Role): For SDE IV candidates, strong system design capabilities are required, including designing scalable backend systems.
- Autonomous Execution: Ability to ramp quickly, understand systems, and deliver features with minimal guidance.
- Communication & Collaboration: Ability to work effectively within engineering teams, communicate tradeoffs, and contribute to technical discussions.
Preferred Skills
- Experience working on consumer facing applications (B2C)
- Exposure to mobile app backend services
- Familiarity with payment processing systems (nice to have, not required)
- Experience with location services, APIs, or mapping integrations
- General understanding of cloud infrastructure (CI/CD, containers) though not a primary focus
Role Expectations
- Build and enhance backend services supporting a mobile application
- Contribute to both feature development and engineering backlog work
- Spend time understanding existing systems to improve future delivery efficiency
- Work across prioritized sprint backlogs with clearly defined near term deliverables (45+ day planning horizon)
- Design and implement scalable APIs and backend components
- Collaborate with engineering teams to deliver production ready solutions
This role balances execution and system understanding, with roughly half the time spent building new features and the other half focused on understanding and improving existing systems.
Level Expectations:
SDE III (Back End Engineer III):
Strong backend developer capable of executing within existing systems
Able to contribute independently with moderate complexity work
Growing system design exposure
SDE IV (Senior Back End Engineer IV):
Highly autonomous senior engineer
Strong system design capabilities
Able to take ownership of complex features end to end
Minimal reliance on team for direction or support
Team Structure
Part of client s 10-4 product engineering group
Cross functional backend focused engineering team
Separate DevOps team manages infrastructure and deployment
Engineers focus primarily on application development, not infrastructure ownership
Interview Process
Technical screening and evaluation led by engineering team
Live coding challenge (CoderPad) focused on algorithmic problem solving
System design interview (especially for SDE IV candidates)
Behavioral and collaboration assessment
Important Expectations:
Candidates must complete coding exercises independently without AI assistance
Emphasis on thought process, not perfect solutions
Candidates should be able to explain and walk through their code
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