Senior Staff Software Engineer, Backend Platform

Patreon•San Francisco, CA

3d•$296,000 - $444,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Patreon is seeking a Senior Staff Backend Platform Engineer to support its mission of funding the creative class. This role is based in San Francisco and operates on a hybrid work model, requiring two days per week in the office. The Backend Platform team builds the foundational systems and infrastructure powering Patreon's creator platform, including core backend services, APIs, databases, infrastructure, and developer tooling. The team is focused on enabling product teams to ship quickly, reliably, and at scale, and is investing in foundational platform capabilities for future growth and product expansion.

Requirements

Extensive experience building large-scale backend systems, with depth in distributed systems and platform architecture (typically 10+ years, or equivalent demonstrated expertise)
Deep expertise in distributed systems, high-throughput APIs, and low-latency architectures that support millions of DAUs
Experience with databases, caching systems, and storage technologies (e.g. MySQL, Postgres, Redis, DynamoDB)
Strong understanding of data modeling, storage systems, caching, queues, and event-driven architectures
Experience in performance optimization across APIs, databases, caching layers, and distributed services
Strong operational excellence mindset, including incident response and production debugging
Experience operating systems in cloud-native environments such as AWS and Kubernetes-based infrastructure
Proficiency in one or more backend languages such as Python, Go, Java, or Rust
Ability to communicate complex architectural trade-offs clearly in writing and in cross-functional forums
Experience mentoring Staff and Senior engineers and contributing to engineering culture through design reviews, documentation, or team standards

Responsibilities

Define and drive the technical strategy for Patreon's backend platform and foundational infrastructure
Lead architecture and implementation of scalable distributed systems, APIs, event-driven systems, and platform services
Lead modernization efforts across backend architecture, service boundaries, data access patterns, and infrastructure
Establish technical standards and best practices around reliability, performance, scalability, and maintainability
Partner with product engineering teams to ensure platform capabilities align with business and product needs
Shape cross-functional technical decision-making at organizational scale
Help evolve operational maturity around incident management, resiliency, and production excellence
Mentor Staff and Senior engineers across the organization through design reviews, technical leadership, and hands-on collaboration