Senior Software Engineer, Consumer Experience

Handshake; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 225,000 - 250,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

401k match

Parental leave

Health benefits

Wellness stipend

Learning stipend

Remote & Office

Job summary

Handshake is hiring a Senior Software Engineer on the Consumer Experience team in San Francisco, onsite. You will build consumer-facing features that connect millions of students with employers and steer the technical direction of the team.

The role focuses on scalable distributed systems and mentorship to elevate engineering quality. You will collaborate with engineers, scientists, and operators to deliver high-quality products in a fast-growing career platform, with full-time US benefits and a

Qualifications

• 8+ years of software engineering experience
• Demonstrated staff-level influence across teams
• Experience building and scaling distributed systems
• Strong proficiency in Go, Python, or JavaScript
• Solid understanding of cloud platforms (AWS/Azure/GCP)
• Exceptional communication skills
• Experience mentoring senior engineers and elevating engineering culture

Responsibilities

• Lead design and development of consumer-facing features
• Architect and scale distributed systems for millions of users
• Influence technical direction with cross-functional teams
• Mentor engineers and promote engineering best practices
• Drive high-quality, scalable production systems

Skills

Software engineering

Staff-level influence

Distributed systems

Go/Python/JS

Cloud platforms

Communication

Mentoring engineers

Tools

Go

Python

JavaScript

Job description

About Handshake

Handshake was founded on a simple belief that everyone deserves a path to a great career, regardless of where they went to school or who they know. Today, we power 25 million job seekers, 1 million+ employers, and 1,600 educational institutions.

In 2025, we started Handshake AI and built the fastest-growing AI data business in history. We work directly with frontier AI lab researchers to create evaluations, publish benchmarks, and push the boundary of data. We’ve grown from $0 to ~$1B run rate and pay ~$60M to over 30K individuals every month.

Why Join Handshake Now

• Shape how every career evolves in the AI economy, at global scale, with impact your friends, family and peers can see and feel
• Partner hand-in-hand with world-class AI labs, Fortune 500 partners and the world’s top educational institutions
• Work together with engineers, scientists, operators, and more from Palantir, Meta, Scale AI, and former YC founders
• Build a massive, fast-growing business with billions in revenue

About Handshake AI

Human data is the core infrastructure to AI advancement. Frontier AI labs currently improve model capabilities with various data-intensive post-training techniques. We believe that data spend for AI training will increase by 3-5x in the next few years and continue for much longer as models take on new domains. Handshake AI supports all of the frontier AI labs, working on their most complex data at the largest scale.

About The Role

As a Senior Software Engineer on the Consumer Experience team, you'll build the products that connect millions of students with employers. You'll drive meaningful technical initiatives, shape the technical direction of the team, and deliver high-quality, scalable solutions that directly impact one of the fastest-growing career platforms in the world.

This job is 5 days a week onsite in our San Francisco, CA office.

Your Role

• Lead the design and development of consumer-facing features that enhance user engagement and streamline the student-employer connection process
• Architect and scale distributed systems to support millions of users, ensuring high availability and performance
• Influence technical direction by collaborating with cross-functional teams to align engineering efforts with business goals
• Mentor and elevate engineers across the team, fostering a culture of growth and technical excellence
• Champion engineering best practices that raise the bar on product quality and team efficiency

Desired Capabilities

• 8+ years of software engineering experience with a proven track record of owning and delivering large-scale, complex systems
• Demonstrated experience operating at a staff-level scope, influencing technical direction across multiple teams
• Expertise in building and scaling distributed systems, preferably within consumer platforms or social products
• Strong proficiency in Go, Python, or JavaScript with a focus on maintainable, high-quality production systems
• Solid understanding of cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP) and modern system design principles
• Exceptional communication skills with the ability to articulate complex technical concepts to diverse audiences
• Experience mentoring senior engineers and elevating engineering culture

Extra Credit

• Background in search, recommendations, ranking systems, or personalization at scale
• Experience with user identity knowledge graphs, including entity resolution and real-time inference
• Experience building AI-powered systems, including LLM-based applications
• Prior experience in high-growth or rapidly scaling environments

Perks

The below benefits are for full-time US employees.

• Ownership: Equity in a fast-growing company
• Financial Wellness: 401(k) match, competitive compensation, financial coaching
• Family Support: Paid parental leave, fertility benefits, parental coaching
• Wellbeing: Medical, dental, and vision, mental health support, wellness stipend
• Growth: Learning stipend, ongoing development
• Remote & Office: Internet, commuting, and free lunch/gym in our SF office
• Time Off: Flexible PTO, 15 holidays + 2 flex days
• Connection: Team outings & referral bonuses

Explore our mission, values, and comprehensive US benefits at joinhandshake.com/careers.

Compensation Range: $225K - $250K