Backend Engineer, Borg

Salary not provided
SQL
AWS
JavaScript
Python
Django
Postgres
Cypress
Flask
FastAPI
Senior level
Remote in Canada, EU, US
Austin
Berlin
Borg

Building the next generation search engine for the social web

Open for applications

Borg

Building the next generation search engine for the social web

1-20 employees

AnalyticsSocial MediaCommunity

Open for applications

Salary not provided
SQL
AWS
JavaScript
Python
Django
Postgres
Cypress
Flask
FastAPI
Senior level
Remote in Canada, EU, US
Austin
Berlin

1-20 employees

AnalyticsSocial MediaCommunity

Company mission

To enable people to trust each other at scale.

Role

Who you are

  • 5+ years experience envisioning and implementing complex, high-availability, high through-put backend systems
  • 2+ years experience writing serverless applications on systems such as AWS Lambdas
  • Experience with scrapping the web at Terabytes scale
  • Python experience, including concepts like asynchronous programming, meta-programming, types, and scientific python
  • Deep Expertise in at least one of the major web frameworks such as Flask, Django, aioHTTP, Pyramid, FastAPI etc
  • Experience with building scalable APIs and optimizing the performance of complex SQL queries touching millions of data points. We use PostgreSQL
  • Experience with E2E testing e.g. Cypress
  • Demonstrated ability to take advantage of cloud-native technologies and techniques to build a robust, high availability platform
  • A growth mindset, being able to balance long term engineering objectives with the immediate development needs of the company and translate them into engineering initiatives
  • Highly collaborative with strong verbal and written communication skills
  • You enjoy writing documentation and understand why it's valuable

Desirable

  • BS/MS/Ph.D. in Computer Science or a related technical field
  • Interest in sociology, anthropology, evolutionary psychology, game theory, or related fields
  • Interest in design, user experience, or related fields
  • Interested in and deeply familiar with some online cultures, sub-cultures, memes, etc
  • You are a power user of some social media platforms and/or a member of some online communities
  • Familiarity with Javascript-based backend technologies such as ExpressJS

What the job involves

  • As a Backend Engineer you will work with the data scientists and product managers to envision and implement a system of reusable services following a cohesive architecture that gives our users, internal and external, all the information and control they could hope for
  • This will typically involve thinking about and implementing efficient systems that can crawl and ingest TBs of data from the open web everyday
  • You will be responsible for making sure that our backend engineering can match the increasing complexity of our challenge as best as possible
  • This not only means that the quality of code and engineering processes is top-notch but also the backend infrastructure is as stable and efficient as it can be at the different stages of the development of the platform
  • Envision and implement crawlers/API-clients that aggregate complex, graphical data into comprehensible descriptions of social networks
  • Architect efficient and reusable backend-end systems that drive complex web applications
  • Collaborate with Product Designers, and Software Engineers to deliver compelling products
  • Identify and resolve performance and scalability issues
  • Planning and coordination of data modeling & feature releases
  • Mentor junior Backend Engineers

Application process

  • We hire for ability, not credentials. You will notice that this is reflected in our recruiting process. The process is designed to test your ability to solve problems that you will face in the role you are applying for. There won’t be any brain teasers or anything else unrelated to what the job will be
  • We invest tens of hours carefully crafting descriptions and the corresponding questions for each role. We spend so much time because we found this to be a good investment. These ads and their corresponding questions have proven to be an excellent filter. Make sure not to skip any questions – they are (by far) the most important part of the application
  • If we like your answers, we will schedule the first interview. There are typically three interviews (+/-1) in total. For some roles, you may receive a take-home task that should take about 2-3 hours to complete. After that, we will ask you to work with us on a trial project for a week. We will pay you for this project. The idea is that you get to experience what it is like to work on our team, and we get a chance to experience what it would be like to have you as a colleague. Within that week, we will either make you an offer or let you know this is not a fit
  • We keep this process to 2-3 weeks from when we get in touch with you

Our take

PageRank is the algorithm used by Google to determine which pages return the most relevant, important, and high quality results for a given search. Borg Collective is looking to develop something similar, but for people: an algorithm that ranks social media profiles so users know who to trust online.

We can see the progress Borg Collective has made already with Hive, an online tool that users can use to identify Twitter communities using a keyword, and see who among the key profiles involved holds the greatest attention and sway. Hive’s touted as a demo of what’s in the Borg Collective pipeline.

Whilst using algorithms to identify clusters of online communities is nothing new in the research community, it’s a tool that hasn’t really been commercially released. Not only would it serve as a buzzy tonic for the current hot-button topic of the credibility issue on social media, it would also work neatly alongside recent marketing tech efforts to help link up brands with the most valuable online influencers. So it will certainly be interesting to see what's in store for Borg Collective and Hive next.

Steph headshot

Steph

Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle

Insights

Few candidates hear
back within 2 weeks

17% female employees

Company

Funding (last 2 of 4 rounds)

Aug 2022

$2.7m

CONVERTIBLE

Dec 2021

$1.3m

CONVERTIBLE

Total funding: $5.6m

Company benefits

  • Fully remote
  • Mostly asynchronous
  • Work from wherever you want
  • 27 holidays
  • Paid sick days
  • Depending on your location and setup, you can join us as a full-time contractor, or we can employ you in your country and take care of benefits, such as health insurance and retirement plans.

Company values

  • We are a mission-driven organization
  • Working at Borg can give a sense of satisfaction and meaning
  • No micromanagement but lots of feedback and coaching

Company HQ

Mitte, Berlin, Germany

Leadership

Maciek Laskus

(Founder)

Salary benchmarks

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Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at Borg

  • We are a fully remote team and hire worldwide
  • Our team members come from and live in America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia

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