Senior - Staff Software Engineer (Backend or Full-stack)

Paperless Post is seeking an experienced (7-17 years of experience) backend or full-stack software engineer to help build and evolve the collection of services that power our best-in-class discovery and events management platform which powers experiences for a complex network of over 220 million hosts and receivers. As a key member of our team, you’ll help craft new core services and iterate on existing ones. You’ll work on all parts of the development cycle and in many different areas of code as part of a deeply collaborative team with a robust development process. 

Beyond technical expertise, we are looking for someone who demonstrates strong leadership behaviors, shows initiative, is accountable for quality and delivery, models our values through their actions, and contributes to a positive, collaborative engineering culture.

The PP Engineering team, a highly collaborative group of developers and technologists, is charged with building and refining a consumer-facing product that millions of people interact with each month. The team you’ll be joining focuses on the highest priority projects across our product domains and is made up of engineers, product managers, QA, and product designers.  We prioritize creativity and continuing education, and our ongoing commitment to quality code shows in our pragmatic but brave approach to technology.

• Design and develop maintainable, reliable, and scalable enterprise-level, services-based software.
• Drive architectural decisions, service design standards, and long-term technical strategies appropriate for your level.
• Define design patterns that ensure performance, scalability, operability, and maintainability and hold feature teams accountable to their correct use.
• Investigate and implement scalable and sound service-oriented architectures that enable cross-functional teams to build, release, experiment iteratively, and detect and resolve production issues quickly.
• Make sound judgment calls that balance iteration speed, technical debt, and long-term architectural integrity, knowing when to optimize for right now and when to design for the future.
• Deploy regular code releases to production and test environments in Agile release cycles.

• A strong sense of ownership and accountability, with the ability to navigate ambiguity and follow through on commitments.
• A proactive and resourceful approach to problem solving, identifying risks early and proposing practical solutions.
• Empathy for previous contributors and a collaborative mindset that supports clear communication and constructive feedback.
• Deep experience with scalable systems including web infrastructure, distributed systems, performance analysis, or large-scale data processing.
• Strong critical thinking skills and the ability to articulate sound technical decisions.
• Solid understanding of frameworks, design patterns, and AWS.
• Knowledge of developing RESTful APIs and maintaining SLAs.
• Proficiency in at least one statically typed language such as Golang, C or Java with Golang preferred.
• If full-stack, experience with Typescript, React, Next.js, and GraphQL within a modern frontend architecture.
• Experience building and deploying services in a distributed environment and understanding service-to-service communication models.
• Ability to mentor engineers and collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams.

Company-wide, we enjoy an amazing ecosystem of an even gender split and a balance of engineers and designers. Because Paperless Post isn't supported by ad revenue, we can focus our efforts on creating and improving on the ideal version of our platform, product, content, and partnerships for our users. 

We are proud that Paperless Post has helped over 220 million people globally connect in the real world since our inception. Paperless Post exists to help all people celebrate all the moments that matter to them. We believe that having a team reflective of the diverse world around us empowers us to create a product that serves everyone. Women, people of color, trans/genderqueer individuals, individuals with disabilities, and veterans are especially encouraged to apply.

At Paperless Post, we value Being Resourceful, Progress Over Perfection, and being a Positive Force. Embracing thoughtful AI use is one way we put those values into practice. In our day-to-day work, we encourage teams to thoughtfully use AI tools like Claude, ChatGPT, and Copilot to move faster and think more creatively.

During interviews, our recruiting team may use AI-powered note-taking tools so we can stay focused on the conversation.

However, our interviews are designed to understand each candidate’s individual skills, problem-solving approach, and reasoning in real time. For that reason, unless explicitly requested and/or approved by the recruiting team, AI tools (including but not limited to generative AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, etc.) may not be used during any interview sessions, including but not limited to:

-Recruiting phone interviews

-Technical screens 

-Live coding challenges

-System design interviews

-Take-home assignments

These conversations are intended to assess your independent thinking and technical depth. If we determine that AI tools were used without disclosure or approval during an interview, it may result in disqualification for the role and removal from the interview process.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations. This policy does not apply to approved accessibility or disability accommodations. If you require assistive technology or other support, please let the recruiting team know.

The compensation range for the Senior Software Engineer role is $165,000 - 185,000 USD.

The compensation range for the Staff Software Engineer role is $200,000 - 235,000 USD.

At Paperless Post, compensation is based on a number of factors, including geographic location, job-related skills, years of experience, and internal team banding. All full-time offer packages come with a base salary, equity component, and options for fully paid medical, dental, and vision benefits. The range posted here is based on the NYC market and may vary based on candidate location.

While this position is remote-friendly, we can only employ in the following locations: New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, California, Colorado, Ohio, Texas, Florida, Illinois, Washington, Maine.