Lead backend systems for identity data at Affirm, ensuring high availability and low latency in a remote-first environment.
Posted by employer 8 hours ago
First seen on Joblaze 1 hour ago
Last verified on the company career page 1 hour ago
Skills & Technologies
What you'll build
- Own and deliver quarterly goals for the team
- Collaborate with product management and design
- Identify and advocate for project issues
- Create and monitor metrics for team artifacts
- Develop talent on the team
Must have
- 4+ years of experience designing backend systems
- Experience with AWS, MySQL, and Kubernetes
- Proficient in Python or Kotlin
- Strong verbal and written communication skills
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience
Requirements
- Experience
- 4+ years
- Education
- Bachelor's degree
Not disclosed in this posting: visa sponsorship.
Benefits
Joblaze summary
In this role, the Senior Software Engineer will focus on developing and maintaining backend systems that manage consumer authentication and verification for Affirm's products. Proficiency in languages like Python or Kotlin, along with experience in AWS, MySQL, and Kubernetes, is essential for delivering high-availability solutions. This position is suited for someone with over four years of experience in backend development, particularly in creating scalable distributed systems. The team emphasizes quality and ownership, fostering a collaborative environment for continuous improvement.
Joblaze insights
- Listed today — first seen on Joblaze October 21, 2026. Last confirmed on Affirm's careers page October 21, 2026.
- This exact title is also open at 1 other location at Affirm: Canada.
- Salary band is in line with the typical range for Backend roles (median ~$180,000).
- Starts above 46% of 147 comparable senior backend roles in United States that list Python we track (median $175,000 across 58 companies). See Python salary trends
- Python appears in 40.2% of 497 comparable senior backend roles in United States; MySQL appears in 4.6% of 497 comparable senior backend roles in United States.
Quick facts
- Is the Senior Software Engineer, Backend (Identity Data) role remote?
- Yes — Affirm lists this as a fully remote position.
- What's the salary range?
- Affirm lists $173,000–$233,000 for this role.
- How much experience is required?
- At least 4 years of relevant experience for this Senior Software Engineer, Backend (Identity Data) role.
- What's the tech stack?
- Joblaze extracted these technologies from the posting: AWS, Kotlin, Kubernetes, MySQL, Python.
- What seniority level is this role?
- Affirm targets senior candidates for this position.
- Is this full-time or contract?
- Full-time for this Senior Software Engineer, Backend (Identity Data) role at Affirm.
From the original posting
At Affirm, we exist for the moments that matter—giving people a clear, predictable way to pay over time, with no hidden fees, no surprises, and no tradeoffs on what matters most.
Identity Engineering owns the systems responsible for onboarding all consumers and managing their authentication and verification journeys across Affirm’s product surfaces. In this role, you will need to gain a deep understanding of the business, product and engineering context, and utilize that context to own and deliver high-availability and low-latency systems on the critical paths for all of our products
What you'll do
- You will be responsible for owning and delivering quarterly goals for your team, leading engineers on your team through ambiguity to solve open-ended problems, and ensuring that everyone is supported throughout delivery.
- You will support your peers and stakeholders in the product development lifecycle by collaborating with product management, design & analytics by participating in ideation, articulating technical constraints, and partnering on decisions that properly consider risks and trade-offs.
- You will proactively identify project, process, technology or business issues, advocate for them, and lead in solving them.
- You will support the operations and availability of your team’s artifacts by creating and monitoring metrics, escalating when needed, and supporting “keep the lights on” & on-call efforts.
- You will foster a culture of quality and ownership on your team by setting or improving code review and design standards for your team, and advocating for them beyond your team through your writing and tech talks.
- You will help develop talent on your team by providing feedback and guidance, and leading by example.
What we look for
- You have 4+ years of experience designing, developing and launching backend systems at scale using languages like Python or Kotlin.
- You have a track record of developing highly available distributed systems using technologies like AWS, MySQL and Kubernetes.
- You have experience defining a technical plan for the delivery of a significant feature or system component with an elegant, simple and extensible design. You write high quality code that is easily understood and used by others.
- You are proficient at making significant changes in a large code base, and have developed a suite of tools and practices that enable you and your team to do so safely.
- Your experience demonstrates that you take ownership of your growth, proactively seeking feedback from your team, your manager, and your stakeholders.
- You have strong verbal and written communication skills that support effective collaboration with our global engineering team.
- This position requires either equivalent practical experience or a Bachelor’s degree in a related field.
Pay Grade - N
Equity Grade - 9
USA base pay range (CA, WA, NY, NJ, CT) per year: $195,000 - $255,000
USA base pay range (all other U.S. states) per year: $173,000 - $233,000
#LI-Remote
Remote-first with flexibility built in
Affirm is proud to be a remote-first company. Most roles can be done from almost anywhere within the country of employment. Some positions may occasionally require in-person work at an Affirm office, and a few are office-based due to the nature of the work. All new hires will be invited to attend an in-person onboarding experience.
By clicking "Submit Application," you acknowledge that you have read Affirm's Global Candidate Privacy Notice and consent to the use of your personal information as described.
Standard company text repeated across Affirm's postings is omitted here.