Principal Staff Engineer - Web Platform

PlanetArt • Calabasas, CA

4d • $130,000 - $195,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

PlanetArt is seeking a Principal Staff Engineer-Web Platform to serve as a senior technical leader within our engineering organization and a key partner to the VP of Engineering. This is a highly hands-on role focused on building, operating, and scaling high-traffic ecommerce web platforms in a fast-moving production environment. Reporting directly to the VP of Engineering, this engineer will play a critical role in architecting, developing, troubleshooting, and maintaining our LAMP-based web applications and AWS infrastructure. The ideal candidate is equally comfortable writing production code, diagnosing complex site reliability issues, managing cloud infrastructure, and leading technical problem-solving during high-severity incidents. This role requires strong operational judgment and the ability to independently own production challenges across application, database, infrastructure, and deployment layers. The engineer will collaborate closely with our China-based development organization, serving as a senior US-based technical lead responsible for cross-team coordination, code quality, architectural guidance, and production stability. This is an ideal opportunity for an experienced engineer who thrives in high-scale ecommerce environments and enjoys combining deep application engineering with modern cloud operations and production ownership. Candidates must be local to or willing to relocate to the Calabasas area as we operate on a hybrid work model (3 days onsite, 2 remote).

Requirements

• 7+ years of professional experience building and operating large-scale web applications, including substantial hands-on experience with the LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP).
• Deep hands-on experience with AWS services and production cloud environments, including EC2, RDS, S3, Lambda, CloudWatch, networking, scaling, monitoring, and infrastructure troubleshooting.
• Experience supporting high-volume consumer-facing websites or ecommerce platforms, with a strong understanding of scalability, uptime, performance optimization, and operational reliability.
• Demonstrated ability to diagnose and resolve complex production issues under pressure, including database replication issues, performance degradation, infrastructure failures, deployment issues, and site outages.
• Strong understanding of distributed web architectures, database performance tuning, replication strategies, caching, queuing systems, and fault-tolerant system design.
• Experience working effectively with offshore or globally distributed engineering teams, with strong communication, coordination, and cross-cultural collaboration skills.
• Ability to communicate in Mandarin (spoken or written) is highly desirable to facilitate collaboration with our China-based engineering team.
• Strong understanding of software engineering fundamentals including Git workflows, CI/CD pipelines, automated testing, observability, code review practices, and secure development standards.
• Self-directed engineer with strong operational instincts, excellent judgment, and the ability to independently own critical technical initiatives from design through production support.
• Demonstrated ability to influence engineering direction, mentor developers, and drive technical excellence through hands-on leadership rather than direct people management.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and maintain scalable features and services across our LAMP-based ecommerce platform, with a strong focus on reliability, performance, maintainability, and operational excellence.
• Act as a senior technical escalation point for complex production incidents, troubleshooting issues across application, infrastructure, networking, database, CDN, and deployment layers. Lead root cause analysis and drive long-term stability improvements.
• Manage and optimize AWS infrastructure, including deployment architecture, scaling strategies, observability, security, disaster recovery, and cost efficiency. Partner closely with DevOps and engineering leadership on operational best practices.
• Monitor and improve application, database, and infrastructure performance for high-traffic consumer web applications. Identify bottlenecks and implement scalable solutions to improve uptime, latency, and system resilience.
• Partner with Product, Design, Operations, and Customer Experience teams to translate business requirements into scalable technical solutions and ensure successful project execution.
• Work closely with the China-based engineering team to coordinate development efforts, conduct code reviews, align on architectural direction, manage releases, and maintain strong engineering communication across time zones.
• Champion high engineering standards through code reviews, testing strategies, documentation, observability, and operational best practices. Drive continuous improvement in system reliability and development processes.
• Provide technical mentorship and architectural guidance across the engineering organization. Influence technical direction through hands-on leadership, strong execution, and collaborative problem-solving.

Benefits

• Health, Dental, and Vision Insurance
• Life Insurance
• Pet Insurance
• Mental Health Insurance
• 401(k) with matching
• Comprehensive Time Off Program including Paid Time Off, Sick Days, Paid Holidays, and Floating Holidays
• Employee Product Discounts

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Education Level: No Education Listed