Principal Software Engineer

Summary

Join Gusto as the Principal Engineer for the Contractors team and play a key role in shaping the future of Gusto's Payroll product. You will design, build, and scale capabilities that power essential experiences for customers, working collaboratively with product managers, designers, and other engineers. As a Gusto Engineer at this level, you will guide projects end-to-end, shaping initial feature specifications, driving architectural decisions, executing on complex initiatives, and maintaining code that powers mission-critical functionality. You will also help define and contribute to the broader strategy of how Gusto continues to build and scale its Payroll product. This role offers the opportunity to solve complex, high-impact problems and contribute to a product that touches the lives of millions.

Requirements

• 15+ years of professional software development experience
• Experience in scaling Engineering organizations with a focus on individual and team development
• Experience building and maintaining resilient backend systems to support customer-facing products
• Experience in highly cross-functional environments for highly complex products
• Experience as tech lead, overseeing projects across multiple teams
• Experience in optimizing existing systems for performance, reliability, and scalability
• Experience developing and maintaining RESTful APIs, GraphQL endpoints, and backend services, ensuring seamless integration with frontend systems and third-party services
• Ability to communicate technical complexity and help facilitate informed tradeoffs
• Enthusiasm for a collaborative, test-driven environment

Responsibilities

• Architect, build, and maintain scalable, secure, and resilient backend systems to support Gusto’s Payroll products
• Function as a Technical Lead across multiple teams in Pay Group, helping us keep engineers unblocked and deliver high-quality work supporting our long-term goals
• Help scale one of the largest Ruby/Rails and TypeScript/React applications in the world
• Collaborate on complex and ambiguous problems with partnerships from Engineering, Product Management, Design, Data Science, Compliance, Operations, and other cross-functional teams
• Mentor and grow fellow engineers working to create holistic and scalable solutions
• Drive the product development process from concept to launch, delivering delightful products that make payroll, taxes, and compliance simple and easy
• Engage in a highly supportive environment,t working with others to drive productivity and innovation
• Continuously stay up-to-date with backend technologies and methodologies, advancements in AI and Machine Learning, and apply this knowledge to our projects

Benefits

• Our cash compensation amount for this role is targeted at $222,000 to $246,000 in Denver & most major metro locations, and $261,000 to $299,000 for San Francisco, New York, & Seattle
• Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors including candidate location, experience and expertise and may vary from the amounts listed above
• We have offices in Denver, San Francisco, and New York and have remote team members across the US and Canada
• We are actively hiring for the following Centers of Gravity: Toronto, Canada, Atlanta, GA, Austin, TX, Chicago, IL, Denver, CO, Los Angeles, CA, Miami, FL, and Seattle, WA
• Our open roles will specify on the careers page and in the job description where the position is eligible for work
• Gusto has physical office spaces in Denver, San Francisco, and New York City
• Employees who are based in those locations will be expected to work from the office on designated days approximately 2-3 days per week (or more depending on role)
• The same office expectations apply to all Symmetry roles, Gusto's subsidiary, whose physical office is in Scottsdale
• Note: The San Francisco office expectations encompass both the San Francisco and San Jose metro areas
• When approved to work from a location other than a Gusto office, a secure, reliable, and consistent internet connection is required