Staff Backend Software Engineer

A SNAPSHOT OF YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES

• Lead design and implementation of RESTful APIs and async workers(Celery) for publishing, media processing, SSAI and VAST-related workflows, imports, and reporting.
• Own reliability and performance of distributed systems and workloads: queue design, deduplication, chord and dispatch patterns, prefetch tuning, backpressure, and operational logging that supports incident response.
• Drive data and integration decisions across PostgreSQL, Redis-backed coordination, object storage, and systems such as data warehouse-backed reporting (batching, limits, and cost-aware query patterns).
• Lead or significantly contribute to Terraform and AWS changes affecting the application: EB tiers, IAM, networking, WAF and rate limits, observability hooks, and phased rollouts.
• Raise the bar on observability: structured logging, Prometheus-style metrics, Grafana and CloudWatch usage, and alarms wired to actionable on-call signals
• Define and evolve testing strategy for critical paths (unit and regression around task helpers and services, AI-driven testing), CI-friendly checks, and operational readiness for risky migrations.
• Represent backend concerns in planning, design reviews, and incident-style discussions; communicate trade-offs clearly to technical and non-technical partners.
• Anticipate scaling and complexity: propose phased migrations, safer defaults, and long-term maintainability over short-term hacks.

WHAT YOU WILL NEED

• 10+ years of professional backend or backend-heavy engineering experience in platform systems, or equivalent depth, including meaningful ownership of large services or platforms.
• Strong Python and a track record designing service-oriented systems: APIs, background jobs, idempotency, failure modes, and capacity thinking.
• Deep hands-on experience with Celery (or similar) and message brokers (AMQP and RabbitMQ-class), including heartbeats, retries, queue splits, and operational debugging.
• Strong SQL (PostgreSQL) and practical Redis usage beyond simple caching: coordination, rate limiting, circuit breaking, and correctness under concurrency.
• Substantial cloud infrastructure experience with GCP and AWS (for example AWS: EC2, ALB, IAM, CloudWatch, S3, RDS and proxy patterns) and comfort leading Terraform changes.
• Container building, deployment (Docker, ECS, Kubernetes), and multi-cloud networking a strong plus.
• Substantial experience with CI/CD in cloud environment.
• Demonstrated leadership in security-minded engineering: scoped IAM, TLS for data stores, network egress discipline, WAF and rate-limiting concepts.
• Experience with authorization at scale (RBAC, ABAC, or policy engines) is a strong plus.
• Excellent judgment under ambiguity, written communication, and a record of raising team quality without blocking delivery.
• Experience in early start-up or otherwise fast moving, rapidly evolving environments, and have ideally built products from 0 to 1.
• Experience successfully driving cross-team alignment to get impactful work shipped, and work with influence over authority.
• Demonstrated experience establishing engineering standards, component architectures, and development best practices

Technical skills

• Languages and runtimes: Python, TypeScript
• Async and jobs: Celery, AMQP, and RabbitMQ
• Data: PostgreSQL, Redis, S3 patterns; Druid, BigQuery, or large analytical query constraints (nice to have)
• APIs: REST, JSON, gRPC, schema validation patterns
• Cloud and Infrastructure-as-Code: AWS, Terraform, Containers, Docker, Elastic Beanstalk exposure
• Observability: Prometheus metrics, Grafana, CloudWatch, structured logging
• Testing and delivery: pytest, Git, GitHub Actions/workflow-style CI/CD
• Domain (nice to have): media, entertainment, creator economy, CTV, OTT, SSAI, VAST, CDN, edge processing

The AI Mandate: AI-Driven Development Practice

This role goes beyond traditional engineering. As a Staff Engineer, you will help define how AI is integrated into backend development. The goal is to unlock smarter execution, faster delivery, and automation at scale, while ensuring responsible and secure use of these technologies.

This includes but is not limited to:
AI-Augmented Backend Development:
Establishing best practices for AI-assisted coding tools (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, etc.) to accelerate development while maintaining high standards for correctness, security, and performance. You will set the bar for responsible and effective AI usage across backend teams.

AI-Enhanced Architecture & Optimization:
Exploring and guiding how AI can assist in system design, performance tuning, and anomaly detection across distributed backend systems. You will influence how AI-powered insights improve throughput, latency, and operational efficiency.

AI-Driven Developer Experience:
Driving improvements in internal tools and workflows that leverage AI to enhance productivity, code quality, and observability, helping evolve backend engineering culture into an AI-native practice.

Willing to consider candidates in Texas

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We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, gender identity, disability, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. We will consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories consistent with applicable law.

Pursuant to state and local pay disclosure requirements, the pay rate/range for this role, with final offer amount dependent on education, skills, experience, and location is $143,000.00-190,000.00 annually. This role is also eligible for various benefits, including medical/dental/vision, insurance, a 401(k) plan, paid time off, and other benefits in accordance with applicable plan documents. Benefits for Union represented employees will be in accordance with the applicable collective bargaining agreement.

View more detail about FOX Benefits.