Staff Software Engineer, Handshake
College career network and job board
Be an early applicant
College career network and job board
501-1000 employees
Be an early applicant
501-1000 employees
Company mission
To democratize access to opportunity and ensure any student can build a great career no matter who they know, where they live or what school they attend.
Role
Who you are
- Significant experience with any systems programming language and/or backend web frameworks. We use Ruby-on-Rails so past experience is a plus but not required
- Strong product sensibility—you care deeply about user experience and business impact, not just the underlying technology
- Full-stack fluency and demonstrated success collaborating with partners in product, design and analytics to define, build, and ship great products and experiences
- Experienced in driving successful architectural decisions across backend and frontend systems with confidence
- Knowledge of observability systems and practices and can use them to avoid or quickly resolve incidents
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to work well within and across teams at Handshake
What the job involves
- Handshake is hiring a Staff Software Engineer to be based in our Berlin office to shape the future of career discovery for Generation Z
- Over the years, Handshake has become a trusted platform for millions of students seeking jobs, connecting with communities, and showcasing their professional identities
- While we've built a fantastic and highly-rated experience, there's still so much more we can achieve—and that’s where you come in
- Act as a technical leader across multiple cross-functional product squads focused on Handshake’s marketplace in Europe and across the globe
- Translate business strategy into technical direction by collaborating closely with Product, Design, Data, and Go-To-Market partners
- Establish engineering best practices for quality, reliability, and scalability across the org
- Mentor engineers and help shape a culture of technical rigor, collaboration, and continuous improvement
- Navigate ambiguity, assess tradeoffs, and make pragmatic decisions that balance long-term scalability with immediate impact
- Technologies You'll Work With:
- Ruby on Rails
- React, TypeScript, Webpack, Redux
- Kubernetes, GCP, PostgreSQL, Redis, ElasticSearch
Our take
The three founders of Handshake established their company in an attempt to eliminate inequality and make the student hiring landscape fairer. The Handshake platform acts as a LinkedIn for college students, pairing students from every walk of life with more than 650K employers, including the entire Fortune 500, which includes Google and Nike.
The graduate recruitment platform is open to any student with a valid @.edu email address, with more than 12 million active users from thousands of colleges and universities. With a student-first philosophy, the company generates revenue from both universities and employers rather than students.
Valued at $3.5B, Handshake has gained traction in a competitive market, although it has strong competition from recruiting giants LinkedIn and Indeed. It stands out, however, by helping students build new relationships and skills, rather than simply making connections to people they already know.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
2% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 7 rounds)
Jan 2022
$200m
SERIES F
May 2021
$80m
SERIES E
Total funding: $434m
Company benefits
- đź’°Equity and ownership in a fast-growing company
- 🍼16 Weeks of paid parental leave for birth giving parents & 10 weeks of paid parental leave for non-birth giving parents
- đź’ťComprehensive medical, dental, and vision policies including LGTBQ+ Coverage. We also provide resources for Mental Health Assistance, Employee Assistance Programs and counseling support
- đź’»Handshake offers $500/ÂŁ360 home office stipend for you to spend during your first 3 months to create a productive and comfortable workspace at home
- đź“šGenerous learning & development opportunities and an annual $2,000/ÂŁ1,500 stipend for you to grow your skills and career
Company HQ
Financial District, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Garrett Lord
(Co-Founder & CEO)Majored in Computer Science at Michigan Technological University. Interned at Palantir Technologies before co-founding Handshake in 2012.
Ben Christensen
(Co-Founder)Graduated from Michigan Technological University with a degree in Computer Networking & Systems Administration. Interned at Target and worked as a Developer at Up and Running Software. Was part of Arbor Networks' ASERT Security Research team.
Scott Ringwelski
(Co-Founder)Attained a degree in Computer Software Engineering from Michigan Technological University. Co-founded Handshake in 2012.
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