Senior Platform Software Engineer (Cache, Query and Compute Platforms)

Medallia, Inc.; McLean (VA); Hybrid; USD 138,000 - 205,000; Full time

Job summary

Medallia seeks a hands-on Senior Platform Software Engineer to operate cache, distributed query, and compute platforms at scale. You will be a key member of Platform Services, ensuring availability, reliability, and performance of Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, and Spark.

Tysons-area hybrid on-site three days a week will be prioritized. Candidate will have extensive experience with distributed platforms in production, incident RCA, and strong programming skills in Java, Go, or Python.

Qualifications

• 5 years of experience in software, systems, platform, DevOps, or reliability engineering.
• 3+ years operating distributed platforms in production.
• Hands-on experience managing and scaling at least two of Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, or Spark in production.
• Experience leading production incident triage, root-cause analysis (RCA), and performance optimization.
• Experience with high availability, disaster recovery, automated node failovers, and zero-downtime upgrades.
• Proficiency in Java, Go, or Python.
• Experience documenting architecture and runbooks across teams.

Responsibilities

• Operate and maintain Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, and Spark platforms.
• Lead production incident triage, RCA, and performance tuning.
• Plan upgrades, capacity, failover scenarios, and recovery procedures.
• Review architectures for production-readiness and reliability.
• Build automation, monitoring, alerts, and troubleshooting playbooks.
• Participate in a periodic on-call rotation to maintain 24/7 reliability.

Skills

Distributed systems

Incident management

Java

Go

Python

Performance tuning

On-call rotations

Tools

Redis

Kvrocks

Trino

Spark

Job description

Overview

Medallia is the pioneer and market leader in Experience Management. Our award-winning SaaS platform, Medallia Experience Cloud, leads the market in the management of experiences, insights, and actions for candidates, customers, employees, patients, and residents alike.

We believe that every experience is a memory that can last a lifetime. Experiences shape the way people feel about a company. And they greatly influence how likely people are to advocate, contribute, and stay. At Medallia, we are committed to creating a world where organizations are loved by their customers and their employees.

We empower exceptional people to create extraordinary experiences together.

Bring your whole self.

The Role and Team

We are seeking a hands-on Senior Platform Software Engineer with experience operating cache, distributed query, and compute platforms at scale. As a key member of the Platform Services team, you will help ensure the availability, reliability, performance, and operational readiness of Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, and Spark.

Responsibilities

• Operate and maintain Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, and Spark platforms.
• Manage Redis Cluster and Sentinel deployments, replication, failover, persistence, upgrades, and performance.
• Validate Kvrocks topology, replication, failover, recovery, and operational readiness.
• Troubleshoot Trino coordinators, workers, catalogs, query execution, S3 access, and Hive Metastore integrations.
• Operate Spark clusters and troubleshoot drivers, executors, scheduling, failover, resource usage, and application health.
• Lead production incident triage, root-cause analysis, and performance tuning.
• Plan and validate upgrades, capacity, failover scenarios, and recovery procedures.
• Review application architectures and production-readiness requirements.
• Build operational automation, monitoring, alerts, documentation, and troubleshooting playbooks.
• Participate in a periodic on-call rotation to maintain 24/7 reliability and performance of production services.

Candidates based in the Tysons vicinity will be prioritized as this role is Hybrid, 3 days per week onsite.

Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications

• 5 years of experience in software, systems, platform, DevOps, or reliability engineering.
• 3 or more years of experience operating distributed platforms in production.
• Cache & Query Platforms: Hands-on operational experience managing and scaling at least two of the following platforms in production: Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, or Spark.
• Experience leading production incident triage, root-cause analysis (RCA), and performance optimization for memory fragmentation, query execution bottlenecks, cluster failovers, and CPU/memory resource utilization.
• High Availability & Fault Tolerance: Experience designing, testing and executing disaster recovery plans, automated node failovers, cluster re-sharding, and zero-downtime upgrades for high-throughput platforms
• Demonstrated experience in Java, Go, Python, or a similar programming language.
• Technical Collaboration & Review: Experience conducting formal architecture reviews, authoring technical design documents (e.g., RFCs/ADRs), and establishing operational runbooks across engineering teams.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with additional platforms among Redis, Kvrocks, Trino, and Spark.
• Experience operating distributed platforms on Kubernetes or cloud infrastructure.
• Experience integrating Trino with object storage, Hive Metastore, or external data catalogs.
• Experience validating topology, failover, recovery, and application-health behavior.
• Experience with platform automation, observability, upgrades, capacity planning, and failure-mode testing.
• Experience supporting large-scale, business-critical cache, query, or compute platforms.

Medallia is committed to equal pay and transparency. The annual base salary range for this position is $138,000 - $205,000. Please note that the salary range information provided is a general guideline and combines all of the distinct labor markets within the US. It is uncommon for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their role and compensation decisions are dependent on a variety of factors. Medallia considers factors such as (but not limited to) scope and responsibilities of the position, candidate's work experience, candidate's work location, education/training, key skills, internal peer equity, external market data, as well as, market and business considerations when making compensation decisions.

Medallia also offers competitive health and wellness benefits, including but not limited to medical, dental, vision, 401(k), short-term and long-term disability, life and AD&D insurance, statutory leaves, paid parental leave, and paid holidays. Benefits and eligibility may vary by location and role.

At Medallia, we celebrate diversity and recognize the value it brings to our customers and employees. Medallia is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age (40 and over), disability, genetic information, veteran status or military service, or any other status protected by state or local law. Individuals with a disability who need an accommodation to apply please contact us at [e-mail]. For information regarding how Medallia collects and uses personal information, please review our Privacy Policies. Applications will be accepted for 30 days from the date this role was posted or until the role has been filled.