Lead/Staff Backend Engineer

Gorilla; United Kingdom; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is seeking a Lead/Staff Backend Engineer to shape the digital backbone of the energy transition. In this pivotal role, you'll design and scale a data platform that powers key decisions for energy companies globally. Your expertise in Python, distributed systems, and relational databases will be essential as you lead architectural decisions and mentor other engineers. This innovative firm is committed to delivering high-performance, data-intensive SaaS solutions, and offers a collaborative environment where your contributions will directly impact the journey to net-zero. If you're passionate about technology and want to make a difference, this opportunity is for you.

Qualifications

• Expertise in Python and modern software design patterns.
• Extensive experience with relational databases and data modeling.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems and their trade-offs.

Responsibilities

• Lead architectural decisions ensuring scalability and performance.
• Drive cross-functional technical initiatives with product teams.
• Mentor engineers and foster technical growth through collaboration.

Skills

Python

Software design patterns

Performance optimization

Relational databases

Data modeling

Distributed systems

Cloud platforms (AWS)

DevOps pipelines

Strong communication skills

Leadership and mentoring

Tools

AWS

Infrastructure-as-code

Container orchestration

Job description

Join us at Gorilla and help shape the digital backbone of the energy transition. As a Lead/Staff Backend Engineer, you'll play a pivotal role in designing and scaling our data platform, powering key decisions for energy companies worldwide. We're committed to delivering high-performance, data-intensive SaaS solutions that help our clients maximize ROI and accelerate their path to net-zero. You'll work at the intersection of deep technical expertise and strategic thinking, contributing not only to our product architecture but also to how we build and scale our engineering culture.
What you'll do

As a Staff Engineer in our Platform team, you'll be a technical leader responsible for evolving and scaling the core API and data systems that support our pricing, forecasting, and analytics applications. You'll balance hands-on development with strategic contributions across teams. Your responsibilities will include:

• Lead architectural decisions across the platform, ensuring scalability, reliability, and performance in high-load, data-heavy environments.
• Drive cross-functional technical initiatives that have a broad impact across the product, working closely with Product Managers, Designers, and fellow Engineers.
• Mentor and support other engineers, fostering technical growth and best practices through design reviews, pair programming, and knowledge sharing.
• Design and build distributed systems that handle complex workflows and large volumes of energy data efficiently and securely.
• Take ownership of critical components, ensuring they evolve with the needs of the business and maintain a high bar for quality and resilience.
• Influence technical direction and culture, helping shape how we build systems and collaborate as a team.
• Contribute to strategic planning, helping define roadmaps and long-term technical vision in partnership with engineering and leadership.

What we're looking for

• Expertise in Python, with a strong command of modern software design patterns, testing practices, and performance optimization.
• Extensive experience with relational databases and data modeling for high-throughput systems.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems design and the trade-offs involved in consistency, availability, and partition tolerance.
• Proven track record of working on data-intensive and high-load backends, ideally within SaaS environments.
• Familiarity with cloud platforms, especially AWS, and experience with infrastructure-as-code and container orchestration.
• Strong architectural intuition and ability to drive clarity in ambiguous, complex technical situations.
• Leadership experience through mentoring, leading initiatives, or shaping engineering practices across teams.
• Experience in defining and improving DevOps pipelines, observability, and platform reliability.
• Strong communication skills and a collaborative mindset-able to build alignment across stakeholders.
• Proactive and pragmatic: able to balance technical excellence with delivery impact.