Senior Backend Engineer: AI-Driven, Scalable SaaS

The Team + The Role The Core team builds features and platform capabilities that power critical areas of the Pendo product experience. The team supports high-stakes customer use cases, shapes how systems evolve over time, and creates a more consistent experience across the platform. This work sits in complex product areas where delivery speed, system reliability, and long-term maintainability all matter. As a Sr. Software Engineer, you will own complex problem spaces and drive them forward independently. You will apply strong engineering judgment to ambiguous challenges, partner closely with Product and Design, and stay accountable to outcomes, not just output. You will break large efforts into small, continuously shippable increments, bring others along with you, and leave the codebase better than you found it. This role is based in our Raleigh office. What this looks like day-to-day Feature ownership: Own complex, ambiguous features end-to-end by structuring work into small, independently shippable increments. Drive delivery with clarity, strong judgment, and accountability for customer and system impact. Production engineering: Write production-ready code and define testing approaches based on risk and system impact. Use safe rollout patterns to reduce risk and enable incremental delivery. Incident response: Respond quickly when production issues arise in your area. Resolve issues and drive follow-up improvements that prevent recurrence. AI-enabled development: Use AI tools as a core part of your daily workflow for code generation, debugging, test writing, and task decomposition. Help raise the bar for how the team uses AI in development workflows. Technical collaboration: Deliver actionable code reviews, accurate documentation, and constructive contributions to technical discussions and planning sessions. Help teammates make better decisions through clear, direct input. Continuous improvement: Identify recurring friction points in code, tests, tooling, or process and proactively improve them. Look for opportunities to make development faster, safer, and more maintainable. Team clarity: Create context that helps the people around you move faster. Write commit messages, notes, and documentation that allow teammates to understand decisions without relying on verbal handoffs. Who You Are Beyond the qualifications, we hire through a specific lens. These aren't buzzwords; they're the things we'll actually look for in how you talk about your work. You're a builder, not a maintainer. You're most energized when there isn't a clear path yet, and you get to define it. You don't wait for direction; you identify gaps, shape solutions, and drive them forward. At Pendo, great Senior Software Engineers don't just follow instructions; they operate as strategic advisors, influencing decisions, guiding stakeholders, and elevating how we work. You're AI-curious - genuinely. You're not using AI tools occasionally. You're rewiring how you work around them. You're faster, sharper, and more prolific because of it, and you bring that energy to everything — how you approach your work, how you prep, how you communicate, how you think. We want someone who sees AI as a multiplier, not a shortcut. Must-haves 5+ years of experience as a Software Engineer, with a track record of delivering customer-facing SaaS product features in a production environment. Demonstrated ability to break ambiguous work into small, deliverable increments and move it forward independently despite ambiguity. Strong proficiency in one or more backend languages, including Go, Java, Python, or C++. Deep understanding of scalable web architecture, API design, and performance optimization. Experience with cloud platforms, including AWS or GCP, and both SQL and NoSQL databases. Experience designing and writing unit, integration, and end-to-end tests, with a clear sense of when and how to apply each. Familiarity with safe deployment and rollout patterns, including feature flags and canary releases. Active use of AI tools as part of your software development workflow. Strong communication, collaboration, and cross-functional partnership skills. Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or equivalent experience. Nice-to-haves Experience improving team-level tooling, processes, or developer workflows beyond your immediate feature work. Experience mentoring or leveling up engineers around you through code review or technical documentation. Contributions to shared platform capabilities used across multiple product areas. About Pendo Pendo was founded in 2013 by former product managers, who combined their heads and hearts to build something they wanted but never had as product managers: a simple way to understand and attack what truly drives product success. Our mission is to improve society's experience with software. Come join one of the fastest-growing startups, supported by best-in-class institutions like Battery Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, Spark Capital and Meritech. Pendo Core Values: Bias to Act, Hone Your Craft, The Team is Pendo, and Maniacal Focus. Location: Raleigh HQ (301 Hillsborough St.) - Pendo is a hybrid culture. In-office 3 days per week unless designated remote. Compensation: The expected base salary range for this role to be performed in Raleigh, NC is $135,000 - $150,000. Benefits: Highly competitive, employer-heavy coverage including $0 premium options, strong 401(k) match, equity, and flexible time off. EEOC: We are an equal opportunity employer and believe having diverse teams where everyone brings their whole self to Pendo is key to our success. We welcome all people of different backgrounds, experiences, abilities and perspectives. Accessibility: Pendo is committed to working with, and providing access and reasonable accommodation to, applicants with mental and/or physical disabilities. If you think you may require an accommodation for any part of the recruitment process, please send a request to: View email address on click.appcast.io. All requests for accommodations are treated discreetly and confidentially, as practical and permitted by law. #J-18808-Ljbffr