Senior WordPress Engineer

Role Description

Senior WordPress Engineer (Freelance)

Who You Are:

• You have a keen eye for details, even the small ones.
• You are an enthusiastic WordPress advocate who is curious about how emerging technologies - including AI - can enhance the platform.
• You are fueled by a balanced blend of humility and confidence.
• You appreciate order and efficiency but have an action-oriented approach.
• You have an appetite for learning and self-development.
• You value autonomy and have the self-management skills to operate dependably in a fully remote role.
• You're actively exploring how AI tools can improve your productivity and code quality.
• You think beyond the code - you're comfortable making architectural decisions, evaluating trade-offs, and guiding technical direction for a project.

What You've Done:

• You’ve had your hands deep in complex, large scale web technology projects.
• You’ve actively participated in mentoring and guiding less experienced developers to follow best practices through code reviews.
• You’ve built complex custom WordPress plugins and themes from scratch.
• You’ve worked extensively with PHP, WordPress, JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.
• You've built custom Gutenberg blocks, Block Editor panels, and sidebar plugins to extend the editing experience.
• You've used performance monitoring and error tracking tools to diagnose issues in production environments.
• You have experience developing for enterprise WordPress hosting platforms such as WordPress VIP, including familiarity with their coding standards, deployment workflows, and code review requirements.

What You'll Do at XWP:

• Be an Engaged Team Member:
  • Contribute to estimations for all tickets in the backlog and participate in Backlog Grooming, Sprint Planning, and Sprint Review Meetings.
  • Adhere to Agile Scrum Methodologies and organizational processes.
  • Be a candid, respectful and supportive teammate and leader.
  • Work closely and collaboratively with others to develop solutions.
  • Shape technical direction in collaboration with teammates, balancing client needs, maintainability, and long-term scalability.
• Champion Engineering Best Practices:
  • Review and write unit, integration, and regression tests when appropriate.
  • Write and maintain unit tests with PHPUnit, enforce static analysis with PHPStan, and build end-to-end tests with Playwright.
  • Conduct architectural peer reviews for code created by other engineers.
  • Set up build and test environments as well as deploying code.
  • Implement PHP and JavaScript Linting.
  • Setting up CI/CD workflows with Github Actions.
  • Implement standard Docker local development environments.
  • Monitor and optimize application performance using tools like Sentry for error tracking, New Relic for application logs and performance metrics, and Lighthouse and Core Web Vitals for frontend performance.
• Write Secure, Performant, Scalable Code:
  • Develop custom WordPress plugins for use at enterprise scale.
  • Object Oriented Programming.
  • Create custom React-based Blocks.
  • Utilize WordPress technologies like WP-CLI and REST API.
  • Build custom, performant SQL queries.
  • Package management tools like NPM and Composer.
  • Responsive interface development and interface extension using JavaScript.
  • Debugging across a wide range of browsers and devices.
  • Develop and maintain plugins and themes that meet WordPress VIP coding standards and deployment requirements.

What Success Looks Like:

• Delivery of quality code, on time, and as estimated.
• Collaborative and effective communication across global time zones and cultures.
• Proactive approach to learning, growth, and sharing.
• Having the trust and confidence of your teammates.
• Leading by example and treating others with respect.
• Thoughtful adoption of AI tools that demonstrably improves code quality, security, and overall quality of work.

Benefits

• Trust and support from your colleagues (we look out for each other and work together towards our shared goals and vision).
• The rewards of a highly collaborative culture (we’re a team, not a working group).
• The joys of remote work done right (schedule flexibility, skip the commute, and more time for family and interests outside of work).
• The chance to play an important part in helping XWP achieve its full potential and make a meaningful difference for our clients, team members and the open web.
• $35 to $60 USD per hour.