Senior Staff Platform Engineer - Database Systems
About The Position
We're hiring a Senior Staff Platform Engineer - Database Systems to lead the design, strategy, and evolution of Quizlet's database and data infrastructure. You'll architect large-scale systems that power Quizlet's most critical services - ensuring reliability, performance, and scalability across millions of global learners. You'll partner closely with other platform and product engineering teams, setting the technical direction for database systems, caching, and data access layers across the company. This role reports to the Senior Director of Technical Infrastructure and is an onsite position in our San Francisco office. Employees are required to be onsite a minimum of three days per week: Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
Requirements
- 10+ years of backend or platform engineering experience, with 5+ focused on large-scale database systems
- Proven experience architecting high-throughput, low-latency database infrastructures in production environments
- Deep expertise in MySQL and PlanetScale; strong proficiency with Cloud Spanner, Postgres, or BigQuery.
- Experience building and leading platform-level automation and self-service tooling using Terraform, Kubernetes (GKE), and Python or Go
- Expertise in observability, monitoring, and incident management for distributed data systems
- Ability to collaborate cross-functionally with engineering, SRE, and product leadership
- Passion for building systems that are secure, resilient, and developer-friendly
Nice To Haves
- Experience running multi-tenant or hybrid database architectures at global scale
- Knowledge of Vitess, Kafka, or Pub/Sub for distributed data access
- Familiarity with service mesh (Istio) or database proxy management
Responsibilities
- Architect and evolve Quizlet's database ecosystem, including Cloud Spanner, PlanetScale MySQL, BigQuery, and Redis, ensuring low latency, strong consistency, and high availability
- Set technical direction for database reliability, observability, and disaster recovery patterns across all product teams
- Lead large-scale modernization initiatives, including performance tuning, connection management optimization, and query efficiency improvements
- Drive platform-wide resilience, building self-healing, automated systems that maintain 99.95% availability across critical services
- Mentor and guide engineers in best practices for database design, caching, and operational excellence
- Partner with leadership to define SLOs, shape roadmap priorities, and align platform strategy with Quizlet's product and AI initiatives
- Contribute to architecture reviews and company-wide infrastructure standards for data storage, access, and security
Benefits
- Total compensation for this role is market competitive, including a starting base salary of $258,000 - $314,000, depending on location and experience, as well as company stock options
- Collaborate with your manager and team to create a healthy work-life balance
- 20 vacation days that we expect you to take!
- Competitive health, dental, and vision insurance (100% employee and 75% dependent PPO, Dental, VSP Choice)
- Employer-sponsored 401(k) plan with company match
- Access to LinkedIn Learning and other resources to support professional growth
- Paid Family Leave, FSA, HSA, Commuter benefits, and Wellness benefits
- 40 hours of annual paid time off to participate in volunteer programs of choice
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
Industry
Educational Services
Education Level
No Education Listed
Number of Employees
251-500 employees
