Sr. Software Development Engineer

Immigration / Work Authorization Notice: At this time, iSpot does not provide visa sponsorship or immigration support for this role. Applicants must already be authorized to work in the United States on a full-time, permanent basis without the need for current or future sponsorship.

iSpot competes for the best talent. Our compensation packages consist of salary and equity in one of Seattle’s hottest start-ups, as well as other standard benefits. Most importantly, we provide a really interesting working experience, and the chance to contribute to the success of something great.

 What You’ll Be Part Of

At iSpot.tv, we deal with BIG data, operating in a high-scale AWS environment with thousands of servers processing massive streams of media metadata. As a Senior SDE, you are a foundational pillar of our engineering team. You don't just write code; you own entire domains, drive scalable solutions, and act as a "go-to" expert.

We are currently looking for an AI-native engineer—someone who views AI not as a novelty, but as a core component of their development lifecycle—to help lead our mission-critical data evolution, including our strategic migration from Redshift to Snowflake.

 Your Impact

1. Technical Excellence & Domain Ownership

• Coding & Debugging: You will design domains with testability and multiple teams in mind, creating extensible and shareable codebases. You are expected to provide prescriptive code reviews that suggest more acceptable code patterns and contribute to company-wide style guidelines.
• System Modernization: You will lead efforts to upgrade legacy systems, refactoring technical debt into scalable, modern architectures, including x-region database migrations and moving to EKS.
• Quality & Release: You will maintain a high standard of quality, setting the example for the team. This involves developing the architecture for our automation systems and expertly debugging complex issues within the CI/CD pipeline. You will be responsible for implementing secure deployment strategies, especially for large-scale, high-risk projects.

2. AI-Driven Productivity & Innovation

• AI-First Mindset: You are expected to be "AI-native." You will actively explore and learn about AI technologies that enhance the efficiency of the entire team’s work.
• Leading Adoption: You don't just use AI; you "create space" for teammates to improve their AI tooling through pairing, providing demos, and writing documentation.
• Creative Problem Solving: You are a pioneer in critical technologies, bringing creative solutions to complex, large-scale projects and ensuring your contributions can be extended far into the future.

3. Operational Excellence & Data Strategy

• Data-Driven RCA: You will propose and implement viable domain measurement solutions. You’ll play a lead role in researching external solutions and leading root cause analysis (RCA) for complex, multi-domain incidents.
• Operational Efficiency & Toil Reduction: You are expected to proactively improve the current state of operations by identifying and reducing toil. You will apply a "Platform Engineering" mindset to automate repetitive manual tasks, ensuring the team remains focused on high-value engineering.
• Scalability & Influence: You will build internal networks to improve organizational speed and the quality of technology solutions, removing obstacles for the team as they arise. You are the "go-to" person for the team, identifying trends and introducing broad solutions to address systemic issues.
• Cost-Conscious Engineering: You will drive a mature cost-optimization strategy, ensuring that architectural decisions and cloud resource utilization are both performant and cost-efficient. You are expected to balance technical excellence with business value, treating cost-consciousness as a core pillar of system reliability.

4. Leadership & Collaboration

• Strategic Alignment: You routinely work cross-functionally to align partners and stakeholders with the project vision and strategy.
• Mentorship: You mentor less experienced team members, ensuring your communication promotes clarity and inspires action. You onboard and coach other engineers in adopting an AI-first mindset, focusing on low-risk strategies.
• Conflict Resolution: You are adept at handling personal conflicts within the team and navigating ambiguity to reach strategic mileston