Staff Engineer – PaaS Messaging/Kafka (Remote)

GEICO; Indianapolis (IN); Remote; USD 105,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is looking for a Staff Engineer to join their innovative PaaS Messaging team. This role offers a unique opportunity to drive the transformation of their insurance business by building high-performance platforms and applications. You will collaborate with distinguished engineers to enhance existing systems and innovate new solutions. The ideal candidate will possess deep expertise in open-source messaging and event streaming, with a strong background in technologies like Kafka and Pulsar. Join a forward-thinking organization that values engineering excellence and fosters a culture of continuous improvement.

Qualifications

• 6+ years of professional experience in software engineering.
• Hands-on experience with open-source messaging and event streaming.

Responsibilities

• Lead technical strategies and execution for the Platform Engineering domain.
• Collaborate with teams to solve complex problems and improve processes.

Skills

Open-source messaging platforms

Kafka

Pulsar

ActiveMQ

Java

Go

Python

C++

Data structures and algorithms

Analytical problem-solving

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science

Tools

CI/CD tools (GIT, Jenkins, CircleCI, SonarQube)

Terraform

Ansible

Grafana

Prometheus

Azure Service Bus

Azure Event Hub

Job description

GEICO is seeking an experienced Staff Engineer to join our PaaS Messaging team. This team is passionate about building high-performance, low-maintenance, zero-downtime platforms and applications. You will help drive our insurance business transformation as we shift from a traditional IT model to a tech organization focused on engineering excellence, fostering a culture of psychological safety and continuous improvement.

In this role, you will collaborate with the Distinguished Engineer and Senior Engineers to innovate, build new systems, enhance existing systems, and identify new opportunities to apply your expertise to solve critical problems. You will lead the strategy and execution of a technical roadmap to increase product delivery velocity and unlock new engineering capabilities. The ideal candidate has deep expertise in open-source messaging and event streaming, with proven experience in Kafka, Pulsar, and/or ActiveMQ.

As a Staff Engineer, you will:

• Provide technical thought leadership across multiple areas of the enterprise
• Collaborate with product managers, team members, customers, and other engineering teams to solve complex problems
• Develop and execute technical strategies for the Platform Engineering domain
• Ensure the quality, usability, and performance of solutions
• Mentor and role model, helping to develop the technical expertise of our engineering and product teams, and influence leadership
• Share best practices and improve processes within and across teams
• Analyze costs, forecast, and incorporate them into business planning
• Determine resource needs, evaluate operational processes, measure outcomes, and promote continuous learning
• Participate in on-call and operational support

Qualifications:

• Hands-on experience designing complex systems, data pipelines, and scalable distributed architectures
• Proficiency in at least one OOP language such as Java, Go, Python, or C++
• Experience with open-source messaging and event streaming platforms like Kafka, Pulsar, ActiveMQ, or RabbitMQ, including concepts like Topic Scaling, Partitions, and Consumer Groups
• Experience building Kafka Connectors or related tooling
• Ability to design, experiment, and influence engineering and product roadmaps
• Experience transitioning research into production environments
• Knowledge of CI/CD, infrastructure as code, and related tools
• Strong understanding of CS data structures and algorithms
• Analytical problem-solving skills using quantitative methods
• Familiarity with developer tooling across the software lifecycle
• Experience with enterprise-scale open-source messaging platforms
• Knowledge of CI/CD tools like GIT, Jenkins, CircleCI, SonarQube, and familiarity with Terraform/Ansible is a plus
• Knowledge of monitoring tools like Grafana and Prometheus is a plus
• Familiarity with Azure Service Bus and Azure Event Hub is a plus

Experience:

• 6+ years of professional experience
• 4+ years with open-source frameworks
• 3+ years in architecture and design
• 3+ years with cloud services like AWS, GCP, or Azure (preferred)

Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or equivalent experience

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Salary Range: $105,000 - $230,000 annually. Final salary will consider role scope, experience, education, location, and market factors.

GEICO considers sponsoring qualified applicants for employment authorization.