# Staff Software Engineer, Backend

**Company:** [Formal](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/formal)
**Location:** San Francisco, CA
**Role:** Backend Engineering
**Experience:** 6+ years
**Skills:** Go, Rust, Temporal, Apache Kafka, Google Pub/Sub, Postgres, S3, MySQL, Snowflake, Redshift, Ssh, AWS, Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform
**Posted:** 2026-06-04

> Design and build a high-performance, real-time data security platform handling large data volumes. Requires 6+ years building scalable backend systems with strong Golang and systems-level experience.

## Job Description

## What you'll do
- Design and develop a high performance data platform that can handle large volumes of data in real-time
- Build new product features from start to finish through to research, implementation, and maintenance
- Help improve performance and reliability of net new and existing features
- Lead any initiative you think may have a strong impact on Formal
- Design scalable services as Formal grows and processes more traffic

## What You Need
- 6+ years of relevant software development experience building data-intensive software platforms
- You value code simplicity and performance
- Strong knowledge of Golang and experience with its ecosystem
- Experience with streaming data processing frameworks such as Apache Kafka and Google Pub/Sub
- Experience debugging and optimizing complex production systems
- Experience working in DBs, OS, networking, or other systems-level environments
- Experience with containerization technologies (Docker, ECS, or Kubernetes) and infrastructure as a code technologies (Terraform)
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to work well within a team
- You are a strong problem solver and have solid production debugging skills

## Nice-to-Haves
- You have worked in a fast, high-growth startup environment before
- You have experience using tools like Temporal and Render
- You have extensive knowledge of datastore protocols (Postgres, S3, Kafka)
- Familiarity with cloud computing platforms, such as Azure or GCP

## Compensation
This role offers cash compensation and a stock options grant. The positioning of offers within a certain range depends on various factors, including: candidate experience, qualifications, skills, business requirements and geographical location.

## Benefits (for U.S.-based full-time employees)
- 100% medical, dental & vision insurance coverage for you
- Partially covered for your dependents
- Flexible PTO

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**Canonical:** https://hotfix.jobs/jobs/926f7fc9-65f0-427d-9906-1332cfad904a