Senior Backend Engineer – Java/AWS

ZipStaff Inc.; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 124,000 - 179,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health Insurance

Dental Insurance

Vision Insurance

401(k) + 401(k) matching

Paid time off

Referral Program

Job summary

ZipStaff is hiring a Senior Backend Engineer for our client to design, build, and operate cloud-native, multi-region AWS-based microservices and data pipelines using Java 17+, Spring Boot, Python, and AWS services.

You will own CI/CD pipelines, observability and performance tuning in PostgreSQL/Aurora, and mentor junior developers while driving fault-tolerant solutions across AZs. This on-site role is in Washington, DC.

Qualifications

• 7+ years of backend software engineering experience on distributed, high-availability production systems.
• Experience with Java 17+, Spring Boot and Python.
• Proficiency with automated unit and integration testing (JUnit, Mockito).
• Experience with CI/CD tooling (GitHub Actions, Jenkins, AWS CodePipeline).

Responsibilities

• Design, build, deploy and maintain scalable microservices and RESTful APIs using Java 17+ and Spring Boot.
• Architect fault-tolerant, high-availability solutions across AWS regions with failover testing.
• Investigate production incidents and perform root cause analysis with CloudWatch observability.
• Build and optimize CI/CD pipelines using GitHub Actions, Jenkins, CodePipeline and CloudFormation.
• Work with relational data models, write complex queries and tune PostgreSQL/Aurora PostgreSQL.
• Drive peer code reviews and mentor junior developers.

Job description

Senior Backend Engineer - Java / AWS

Location: Washington, DC (On-site)

Employment Type: W2 Contract

About the Opportunity:

ZipStaff is hiring a Senior Backend Engineer for our client, a national passenger transportation organization, to build and support the cloud-native integrations and transaction-processing services behind critical operational systems. You will take hands-on ownership of resilient, multi-region AWS architectures, event-driven pipelines and automated CI/CD workflows, ensuring high reliability, rapid disaster recovery and seamless B2B data exchange.

What You'll Do:

• Design, build, deploy and maintain scalable microservices, RESTful APIs and event-driven architectures using Java 17+, Spring Boot, Python and AWS integration services.
• Architect fault-tolerant, high-availability solutions across multiple AWS Availability Zones and Regions, including failover testing and reducing MTTR.
• Investigate complex production incidents, perform root cause analysis and implement observability with Amazon CloudWatch.
• Build and optimize CI/CD pipelines using GitHub Actions, Jenkins, AWS CodePipeline and CloudFormation infrastructure-as-code.
• Implement relational data models, write complex queries and tune performance on Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL.
• Drive peer code reviews, champion automated testing standards (JUnit, Mockito) and mentor junior developers.

Required Qualifications:

• 7+ years of professional backend software engineering experience on distributed, high-availability production systems.
• Advanced hands-on proficiency in Java 17+, Spring Boot and Python.
• Extensive experience with AWS services including ECS/Fargate, EventBridge, SQS, SNS, Lambda, S3 and CloudWatch.
• Strong PostgreSQL / Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL skills, including schema design, query optimization and tuning.
• Experience managing automated deployments with Jenkins, GitHub Actions, AWS CodePipeline and CloudFormation.
• Proficiency with automated unit and integration testing frameworks (JUnit, Mockito).
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering or a related field, or equivalent experience.
• Ability to work on-site in Washington, DC.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Active AWS certification (Solutions Architect, Developer Associate or Cloud Practitioner).
• Experience with EDI, B2B messaging integrations or high-volume transportation/logistics systems.
• Based within or easily accessible to the Northeast Corridor for periodic on-site planning sessions.

Benefits:

• Health Insurance.
• Dental Insurance.
• Vision Insurance.
• 401(k) + 401(k) matching.
• Paid time off.
• Referral Program.

About ZipStaff:

ZipStaff connects skilled technology professionals with leading organizations across the United States, matching top talent with impactful contract and full-time opportunities.