Staff Software Engineer

topsteptrader; United States; Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Company-paid holidays

Health, dental, and vision insurance

401(k) matching

Remote or hybrid work options

Job summary

Topstep is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to be the go-to technical leader for our trading platform. You will own end-to-end system design for real-time trading, market data delivery, and broker integrations, using a modern .NET stack and cloud-native services.

You’ll mentor engineers, shape engineering standards, and drive architecture decisions across teams while balancing reliability, performance, and evolving business needs.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of software engineering experience building and shipping production systems at scale.
• Proficiency in C# and the .NET ecosystem.
• Experience with React/TypeScript frontend.
• Experience designing service boundaries and API versioning in a microservices or modular architecture.
• Extensive experience building distributed, high-availability systems with asynchronous, event-driven communication.
• Deep database experience with PostgreSQL or SQL Server, including schema design and query optimization.
• Observability tools and distributed tracing in production environments.
• Proven track record of owning production systems, including debugging and incident response.
• Experience with Docker and AWS.
• Strong testing mindset and ability to mentor engineers.
• Ability to balance technical debt with feature delivery and communicate trade-offs.

Responsibilities

• Design and build services and APIs powering core trading platform capabilities.
• Own initiatives end-to-end from technical design through production deployment, monitoring, and iteration.
• Collaborate with product and design to translate user needs into scalable, maintainable technical solutions.
• Contribute to system architecture decisions and establish patterns for other teams.
• Write clean, well-tested code with emphasis on reliability and performance.
• Participate in on-call rotations, respond to incidents, and improve system reliability.
• Build observability into systems through metrics, logging, and tracing.
• Occasionally work across the stack including React/TypeScript frontend.
• Mentor engineers through code reviews and pairing, sharing knowledge on design and best practices.
• Balance technical debt against feature delivery considering business priorities.

Skills

C# & .NET

Distributed systems

Microservices

React/TypeScript frontend

Cloud platforms

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

PostgreSQL

SQL Server

AWS

Job description

Are you an engineer who thrives on solving the hardest technical problems on a team? Topstep is looking for a Staff Software Engineer to be a go-to technical leader for our trading platform. In this role, you'll address cross-team engineering challenges to design and build the systems that power real-time trading, market data delivery, and brokerage integrations - the systems thousands of active traders depend on with real money on the line.

You’ll work primarily in a modern .NET stack, building cloud-native services that handle high-throughput workloads, and occasionally work across the stack in our React/TypeScript frontend. This isn't just about shipping features - you’ll shape architectural decisions, establish engineering standards, and ensure our platform scales reliably as we grow. You’ll own your systems end-to-end, from initial design through production operations.

This role is ideal for someone who combines deep technical expertise with the judgment to navigate ambiguity and complexity. You’ll balance robust, maintainable systems against the reality of evolving business requirements, contribute to technical strategy, mentor other engineers, and help define what engineering excellence means at Topstep.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and build services and APIs that power core trading platform capabilities.
• Own initiatives end-to-end, from technical design through production deployment, monitoring, and iteration.
• Collaborate with product and design to translate user needs into scalable, maintainable technical solutions.
• Contribute to system architecture decisions, establishing patterns and practices that other teams can follow.
• Write clean, well-tested code with strong focus on reliability, performance, and operational excellence.
• Participate in on-call rotations, respond to incidents, and drive continuous improvement of system reliability.
• Build and maintain observability into your systems through metrics, logging, and distributed tracing.
• Occasionally work across the stack, contributing to the React/TypeScript frontend as features require.
• Mentor engineers through code reviews, pairing sessions, and sharing knowledge about system design and best practices.
• Balance technical debt against feature delivery, making thoughtful trade-offs based on business priorities and technical constraints.
• Strengthen engineering culture through documentation, tooling improvements, and process refinements.

Required Qualifications and Key Competencies

• 8 + years of software engineering experience building and shipping production systems at scale.
• Deep proficiency in C# and the .NET ecosystem, with a track record of designing production services used across multiple teams.
• Experience with React, TypeScript, or other modern frontend frameworks.
• Experience designing service boundaries and API versioning in a microservices or modular architecture.
• Extensive experience building distributed, high-availability systems, including asynchronous, event-driven communication between services (e.g., message queues, pub/sub, or streaming).
• Deep database experience with PostgreSQL or SQL Server, including schema design, query optimization, and transactional behavior.
• Experience with observability tools and distributed tracing in production environments.
• Proven track record of owning production systems, including debugging and incident response.
• Experience with container technologies (Docker) and cloud platforms (AWS)
• Strong testing mindset with practical experience across unit, integration, and system testing.
• Proven capability leveraging AI developer tooling effectively while upholding rigorous standards for code health and maintainability.
• Excellent problem-solving skills, with the ability to debug complex issues across multiple systems.
• Demonstrated ability to build consensus and drive complex technical initiatives across teams without relying on direct authority.
• Excellent communication skills, including the ability to explain technical trade-offs to both engineering and product stakeholders.

Preferred

• Kubernetes experience (EKS or equivalent), Helm, or GitOps (ArgoCD) tooling.
• Experience with real-time client comms (SignalR/WebSockets).
• Background in high-throughput, low-latency systems, including performance tuning across multiple services.
• Incident leadership (RCA, remediation follow‑ups).
• Previous work in financial services, fintech, or other compliance-regulated environments.
• Understanding of trading systems, market data, or brokerage operations.

Company Culture & Perks

• Topstep is an engaging working environment that ranges from fully remote to hybrid. We foster a culture of collaboration by keeping cameras on during meetings and maintaining a robust Slack environment for communication.
• Seven Company-paid Holidays and generous Family Leave. Paid time off is front-loaded.
• Competitive 401(k) matching, health, dental, and vision insurance are offered for full-time employees.
• Vacations are e