Senior Back-end Engineer

About Toptal

Toptal is a global network of top freelance talent in business, design, and technology that enables companies to scale their teams, on-demand. With $200+ million in annual revenue and over 40% year-over-year growth, Toptal is the world’s largest fully remote company.

We take the best elements of virtual teams and combine them with a support structure that encourages innovation, social interaction, and fun. We see no borders, move at a fast pace, and are never afraid to break the mold.

Position Description

Ruby on Rails powers a lot of our infrastructure, and we’re always looking for smart Ruby developers to help us reach the next level!

As members of the technical teams at Toptal, we help with the introduction and adoption of new technologies, as defined by our architects. We research, implement, test, and help other teams integrate new tools, and we maintain some microservices that are in use across the whole Engineering department. Most of our work is in Ruby, but we are not limited to it; we also develop and support Elixir, Node.js solutions, we work with ElasticSearch and Kafka, and we are into Docker, Kubernetes, and others.

We are a product team delivering value to the end-users working closely with the business. You will have the opportunity to develop new features and improve the quality of the existing codebase.

This is a remote position that can be done from anywhere. Due to the remote nature of this role, we are unable to provide visa sponsorship. Resumes and communication must be submitted in English.

Responsibilities:

• Write elegant, efficient, and testable Ruby code that is easy to maintain and debug.
• Cover code with tests and perform manual testing of features, while reviewing the work of colleagues.
• Work on the infrastructure part of the project, collaborating with infrastructure Engineers.
• As a true teammate, continuously improve the team’s processes, brainstorm ideas, and communicate statuses, and progress.
• Mentor team members, provide feedback, and continuously improve as a professional.
• Learn new concepts and technologies.

In the first week, expect to:

• Join our team, where you will be introduced to Toptal’s practices and processes.
• Start participating in company-wide training sessions.
• Set up your local environment and get familiar with our tech stack.
• Create your first pull request.

In the first month, expect to:

• Familiarize yourself with the team’s business domain.
• Contribute to our product development.
• Develop a deeper understanding of our technologies, processes, and product pipeline.

In the first three months, expect to:

• Actively supply software planning, development, and maintenance.
• Suggest and implement improvements to Toptal’s processes and codebase.

In the first six months, expect to:

• Lead technical initiatives in our team.
• Drive improvements to the codebase and processes.

In the first year, expect to:

• Have a detailed understanding of Toptal’s technical stack, collaboration rituals, processes, and performance.
• Mentor Toptal’s new team members.

Requirements:

• Have 3+ years of web development experience with Ruby.
• Have a strong knowledge of object-oriented programming, automated software testing, databases, development, and testing essential methodologies.
• Consider multiple quality dimensions like user impact, failure tolerance, code maintenance, implementation time, security breaches, and performance.
• Be genuinely interested in technology and love to try new things.
• Tackle complex problems but also consider multiple solutions, weigh them, and decide on the best course of action.
• Thrive on providing and receiving transparent but always constructive feedback. Additional advantages:
• Knowledge of GraphQL.