Backend System Engineer

bol; Utrecht; On-site; EUR 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

29 days to recharge

Travel costs covered

Pension plan

Annual bonus

Job summary

bol is seeking a Backend System Engineer for the ShopCore-BackEnd team in Utrecht to own and evolve the backend foundation that powers bol's shopping experience. You will build and operate platform services, automate operations, and improve observability and reliability across 55+ teams.

You will work with Kubernetes, cloud infra, CI/CD, and infrastructure-as-code while growing your backend software development skills and exploring AI-assisted development to enhance the platform.

Qualifications

• Bachelor or Master degree required.
• 7-10+ years of experience in backend/system engineering.
• Experience with Kubernetes and cloud infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Build and operate reliable platform services for 55+ teams.
• Automate operational processes with tooling and scripting.
• Improve observability, monitoring, and incident response.
• Work with Kubernetes, cloud infrastructure, CI/CD and infrastructure-as-code.
• Enhance platform reliability, scalability, and security.
• Contribute to backend services and APIs.
• Collaborate with engineers, product managers and other teams.
• Explore how AI can improve the platform.

Skills

System mindset

Platform engineering

Backend development

AI exploration

Education

Bachelor / Master

Tools

Kubernetes

Google Cloud Platform

Gitlab

Spring Boot

GraphQL

CI/CD

Golang

Java

Kotlin

AI-assisted development

Job description

Own the backend foundation. Accelerate every shop team.

Backend System Engineer

• Bachelor / Master
• Utrecht
• 7-10+ year

How will you make our customers happy?

Every feature bol's shop teams produce, whether it's a customer-facing website innovation, an in-app UX improvement, or an update across emerging shopping channels, is built on a backend environment that you help create, cultivate, and evolve.
As a System Engineer in ShopCore-BackEnd, you help build, operate, and improve the technical foundation that enables dozens of teams to scale, experiment, and ship with confidence, without having to worry about what's happening under the hood. Every improvement you make in reliability, automation, observability, and platform capabilities accelerates product teams, strengthens the platform, and helps millions of customers enjoy a better shopping experience. Our shop teams are eager to move faster. If you can help make that happen, we'd love to talk to you.

The biggest challenge

The challenge isn't just adding backend capabilities; it's building and evolving the platform that 55+ teams depend on. Behind every successful feature team is a foundation of reliable systems, scalable infrastructure, automation, observability, and backend services that they can trust.
You'll help shape that foundation by solving scalability challenges, improving reliability and engineering effectiveness, and enabling product teams to build and ship faster. You'll work on platform reliability, automation, observability, and operations, while expanding your software engineering skills through backend development and platform evolution.

What you do as the System Software Engineer – ShopCore - BackEnd

You are part of the ShopCore-BackEnd team, which builds and operates the backend capabilities that enable shop teams to create better consumer experiences faster.
Your responsibilities include:

• Build and operate reliable platform services that support 55+ teams
• Automate operational processes and reduce manual work through tooling and scripting
• Improve observability, monitoring, alerting, and incident response capabilities
• Work with Kubernetes, cloud infrastructure, CI/CD pipelines, and infrastructure-as-code solutions
• Help improve platform reliability, scalability, and security
• Contribute to backend services and APIs by growing your software engineering skills li>
• Collaborate with software engineers, product managers, and other platform teams
• Explore how AI can help us build and operate a better platform

How you can make the difference

You have a strong systems mindset and enjoy improving complex technical environments. You may come from a System Engineering, Platform Engineering, or Infrastructure background and want to broaden your impact by combining platform engineering with backend software development.
You will join the ShopCore - BackEnd team (~9 engineers), part of the Technical Shop Foundation within the Consumer Journey domain. We run business-critical services where stability matters, while continuously improving our architecture, reducing operational overhead, increasing automation, and exploring how AI can help us build a better platform. The team owns the Shop API (federated GraphQL), the Shop Router and several backend services that form the foundation of bol's shopping channels.You don't need to be a software engineering expert from day one. Curiosity, ownership, and a strong technical foundation matter most. You will work alongside experienced engineers to gradually expand your software engineering skills while helping build and operate the platform that powers bol's shopping experience.Tech stack
Kubernetes, Google Cloud Platform, Gitlab, Spring Boot, GraphQL, CI/CD, Golang, Java, Kotlin, AI-assisted development.

3 reasons why this is (not) for you

• Curious engineer

  You enjoy tackling unfamiliar problems, improving complex systems, and learning new technologies. Whether the challenge is reliability, automation, infrastructure, or backend development, you're eager to understand how things work and make them better.

• Team ownership

  You believe great software is built together. You actively collaborate, you take responsibility, share knowledge, ask for feedback, and help your teammates succeed because you know the best solutions come from collective thinking.

• Growth mindset

  You continuously improve yourself, your team, and the way we work. Whether it is refining engineering practices, improving platform reliability, or exploring new technologies such as AI, you are always looking for ways to get better.

Perks of having a blue heart

29 days

to recharge

Travel costs

Public transport, car, parking & charging covered

Pension plan

75% premium covered

Annual bonus

Based on sustainability goals