Staff Backend Engineer - CX & AI Platform

Whatnot; New York (NY); Hybrid; USD 230,000 - 290,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Generous holiday and time off policy

Health insurance options (Medical, Den

Vision

Work From Home Support

Home office setup allowance

Monthly phone & internet allowance

Wellness allowance

Childcare allowance

Lifetime family planning benefit

401k employer match (up to 4%)

Dogfood budget for app

16 weeks paid parental leave

Job summary

Whatnot seeks a Staff+ Backend Engineer to build and scale the Customer Experience platform that serves buyers, sellers, and support channels. You will guide architectural direction, ensure reliable, scalable backend systems, and connect workflows across CX surfaces to enable efficient issue resolution.

You will lead multi‑team efforts, drive measurable improvements in reliability, and mentor engineers while balancing customer trust with business needs.

Qualifications

• Customer experience domain depth: Experience in customer support, service marketplaces, or operations-facing systems.
• Backend systems expertise: Design, build and operate high-scale backend services.
• Technical strategy and architecture: Set direction and evolve legacy systems without blocking delivery.
• End-to-end ownership: Lead initiatives from problem discovery to launch and iteration.

Responsibilities

• Lead architecture and delivery across multi-team initiatives.
• Tradeoffs between near-term impact and long-term platform health.
• Raise the quality and effectiveness of the engineering organization.
• Surface risks and dependencies early across teams.

Skills

Customer experience

Backend systems

Technical strategy

End-to-end ownership

Product judgment

Quality and reliability

Staff-level leadership

Collaborative teammate

Tools

Python

Elixir

PostgreSQL

Job description

Whatnot seeks a Staff+ Backend Engineer to build and scale the Customer Experience platform that serves buyers, sellers, and support channels. You will guide architectural direction, ensure reliable, scalable backend systems, and connect workflows across CX surfaces to enable efficient issue resolution.

You will lead multi‑team efforts, drive measurable improvements in reliability, and mentor engineers while balancing customer trust with business needs.