Backend Engineer (Python, SQL)

About The Company Affirm is a financial technology company dedicated to reinventing credit to make it more honest and friendly. Our mission is to provide consumers with flexible, transparent financing options that enable them to buy now and pay later without hidden fees or compounding interest. We strive to create a seamless and trustworthy experience for our users, fostering financial empowerment and accessibility. As a remote-first organization, Affirm values innovation, inclusivity, and transparency, ensuring that our team members are empowered to contribute meaningfully from anywhere within the country.

About The Role We are seeking a highly experienced Staff Software Engineer, Backend (Powered By Affir) to join our dynamic team. In this role, you will be instrumental in shaping the technical strategy for your team over a long-term horizon, aligning business objectives with scalable and reliable backend solutions. You will be responsible for the full lifecycle of our APIs, from design and development to maintenance and evolution, ensuring they meet high standards of quality, performance, and security. Collaboration across product management, design, and analytics teams will be essential to deliver integrated solutions that support our enterprise merchants and partners. Your leadership will foster a culture of technical excellence, ownership, and continuous improvement, driving impactful projects that influence the company’s growth and customer experience.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience as a software engineer, with a strong background in backend development.
• Proficiency in designing, developing, and deploying large-scale backend systems.
• Expertise in technologies such as Python, Kotlin, AWS, MySQL, and Kubernetes.
• Experience delivering major features, system components, or deprecating existing functionalities with clear technical planning.
• Strong coding skills with an emphasis on high-quality, maintainable, and understandable code.
• Ability to operate comfortably across different levels of system architecture, from low-level idioms to high-level design.
• Proven track record of gathering and iterating on feedback from cross-functional teams.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, supporting effective collaboration with global teams.
• Either a Bachelor’s degree in a related field or equivalent practical experience.

Responsibilities

• Set and execute the technical strategy for your team, aligning it with business goals and long-term vision.
• Contribute to the entire API lifecycle, including designing, developing, testing, maintaining, and evolving APIs to ensure scalability and reliability.
• Collaborate with product management, design, and analytics teams to deliver integrated solutions that meet stakeholder needs.
• Define and advocate for technical solutions and operational processes, acting as a force-multiplier for your team.
• Ensure operational excellence by implementing monitoring, triage rotations, playbooks, policies, testing, and alerting systems.
• Foster a culture of quality and ownership by setting coding and design standards, conducting code reviews, and leading technical discussions.
• Mentor and develop team members by providing constructive feedback and leading by example in technical excellence.
• Participate in strategic planning and contribute to the continuous improvement of engineering practices and processes.

Benefits

• Health care coverage — Affirm covers all premiums for medical, dental, and vision insurance for employees and their dependents.
• Flexible Spending Wallets — generous stipends for technology, food, lifestyle needs, and family planning expenses.
• Time off — competitive vacation and holiday schedules to support rest and rejuvenation.
• Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) — opportunity to purchase Affirm shares at a discounted rate.
• Remote-first work environment — flexibility to work from anywhere within the country, with occasional office visits if required.
• Inclusive culture — commitment to providing reasonable accommodations and fostering diversity and inclusion.

Equal Opportunity

Affirm is committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and consider applicants without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status. We provide reasonable accommodations during the hiring process to ensure equitable access for all candidates.