Staff Tech Lead, Backend

W. W. Grainger; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 134,000 - 224,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, vision, and life ins.

PTO and holidays

401(k) with company match

Employee discounts, tuition and loans

Maternity/Paternity leave

Job summary

W. W. Grainger, Inc.

in Chicago seeks a Lead Software Engineer (Software Engineer IV) to drive architecture and delivery of scalable applications on the Customer Order team. You will mentor engineers and collaborate with Product Managers and Architecture to translate business requirements into robust software. The role emphasizes maintaining production software, enabling continuous delivery, and guiding the team through design decisions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent.
• 5+ years as a software engineer in scalable systems.
• Expert programming skills and distributed systems knowledge.
• Familiar with Agile/Scrum and DevOps practices.
• Experience building HTTP APIs.

Responsibilities

• Lead engineer on a team responsible for the application and delivery of high-quality, maintainable software for highly complex applications.
• Influence team adoption of sensible defaults to enable continuous delivery activities.
• Contribute to continuous learning on your team culture by leading knowledge sharing sessions with latest technological features and engineering practices.
• Maintain software in production with demonstrated ability to triage and resolve issues.
• Mentor developers, conduct code reviews, and participate in pair programming.
• Partners directly with IT Management team to ensure successful design and delivery of technology based solutions.

Skills

Software engineering

Programming skills

Distributed systems

Agile methodologies

DevOps practices

HTTP APIs

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or equivalent

Job description

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W.W. Grainger, Inc. is a leading broad line distributor with operations primarily in North America and Japan. At Grainger, We Keep the World Working®by serving more than4.6 million customersworldwide with maintenance, repair andoperating(MRO) products and value-added solutions delivered through innovative technology and deep customerexpertise. Known for its commitment to service and purpose-driven culture, the Company reported2025 revenue of$17.9 billion. For more information, visit www.grainger.com.

Compensation

The anticipated base pay compensation range for this position is $134,100.00 – $223,500.00. This role is eligible for an incentive target of up to 15% or $, based on the achievement of individual and company performance objectives in accordance with the current terms of the incentive program which are subject to change.

Rewards and Benefits

With benefits starting on day one, our programs provide choice and flexibility to meet team members' individual needs, including:

• Medical, dental, vision, and life insurance plans with coverage starting on day one of employment and 6 free sessions each year with a licensed therapist to support your emotional wellbeing.
• 23 paid time off (PTO) days annually for full-time employees (accrual prorated based on employment start date) and 6 company holidays per year.
• 6% company contribution to a 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan each pay period, no employee contribution required.
• Employee discounts, tuition reimbursement, student loan refinancing and free access to financial counseling, education, and tools.
• Maternity support programs, nursing benefits, and up to 14 weeks paid leave for birth parents and up to 4 weeks paid leave for non-birth parents.

The pay range provided above is not a guarantee of compensation. The range reflects the potential base pay for this role at the time of this posting based on the job grade for this position. Individual base pay compensation will depend, in part, on factors such as geographic work location and relevant experience and skills.

The anticipated compensation range described above is subject to change and the compensation ultimately paid may be higher or lower than the range described above.

Grainger reserves the right to amend, modify, or terminate its compensation and benefit programs in its sole discretion at any time, consistent with applicable law.

As a Lead Software Engineer (Software Engineer IV) you will develop applications that align with a strategic vision. In addition to coaching engineers, you will partner with key stakeholders including Product Managers and Architecture. You will embrace curiosity to ensure a deep understanding of the business requirements that drive the analysis and physical design of technical solutions.

You will work as a Staff engineer on a Customer Order team. The team is responsible for largely three things:

• The cart customers interact with on, eventually, all channels at Grainger. Currently this is limited to our main Grainger.com experience.
• Provide internal capabilities to calculate the cost of an Order to a customer. This means resolving interesting Freight, Pricing and Tax considerations for our customers.
• Lastly, we manage the payment and invoicing capabilities to ensure people can securely access their payment information.

To give you a picture of our scale, we can see 100,000s orders per day and each one of those has at least one cart, one payment method, and one order calculation. We are a critical component of the customer’s experience and require a team that build solutions that scale.

You Will

• Lead engineer on a team responsible for the application and delivery of high-quality, maintainable software for highly complex applications
• Influence team adoption of sensible defaults to enable continuous delivery activities
• Contribute to continuous learning on your team culture by leading knowledge sharing sessions with latest technological features and engineering practices
• Maintain software in production with demonstrated ability to triage and resolve issues
• Mentor developers, conduct code reviews, and participate in pair programming
• Partners directly with IT Management team to ensure successful design and delivery of technology based solutions

You Have

• Bachelor's Degree or equivalent experience in computer science or similar; or equivalent experience required
• 5+ years experience as a Software Engineer; with experience in modern software engineering; designing; devloping, testing and deploying scalable software applications within a variety of technologies and environments. required
• Expert knowledge of programming skills
• Demonstrated knowledge of distributed system design and integration patterns
• Familiarity with Agile/Scrum methodologies and Dev Ops Practices
• Experience with analyzing, interpreting and communicating complex problems and practices
• Experience building HTTP APIs

We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or expression, protected veteran status or any other protected characteristic under federal, state, or local law. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace.

We are committed to fostering an inclusive, accessible work environment that includes both providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities during the application and hiring process as well as throughout the course of one’s employment, should you need a reasonable accommodation during the application and selection process, including, but not limited to use of our website, any part of the application, interview or hiring process, please advise us so that we can provide appropriate assistance.