Software Engineer II

Software Engineer II
Location: Dallas, TX (On-site: 5 days in office) 

Stronghold Investment Management (“Stronghold,” “SIM,” or “the Firm”) is a technology-driven, vertically integrated investment manager focused on real-assets and related private markets. Stronghold seeks to deliver best-in-class risk-adjusted returns through an investment framework that features comparatively rapid transaction velocity, deep technical expertise, creative financial structuring, and objective and algorithmic decision making.

Stronghold was founded by Ryan Turner in 2016 and has deployed over $1.6 billion in capital across 10+ investment vehicles. Ultimately, Stronghold intends to apply its technology-intensive investment approach to a variety of specialist real assets verticals, including:

• Oil & Gas
• Renewables
• Specialty Real Estate (commercial, datacenters, marinas)
• Telecommunications and Technology Infrastructure
• Billboards and Fixtures
• Mining & other commodities
• Utilities
• Secondaries

Your Mission
We're seeking a Software Engineer II to join Stronghold's Tech Development team, where your backend and data systems work directly powers a technology-driven investment firm moving billions of dollars across real assets globally.

This isn't a typical engineering role. You'll build the scalable, high-performance infrastructure that gives Stronghold its edge: fast transaction velocity, algorithmic decision-making, and data systems that no traditional investment firm has. Working primarily within a Ruby on Rails ecosystem, you'll help develop and scale backend services powered by technologies including PostgreSQL, Kafka, Elasticsearch, Redis, and Microsoft Azure .

You'll work alongside senior engineers and cross-functional teams to shape architecture, drive performance, and own meaningful pieces of a stack that's genuinely differentiated in private markets.

This is a rare opportunity for a software engineer with 3–6 years of experience who's ready to go beyond feature work, someone who wants their technical decisions to matter, their contributions to be visible, and their career to accelerate inside a firm that moves fast, thinks deeply, and invests in its people.

Key Responsibilities – What You’ll Own

• Build the backbone. Design, develop, test, and maintain the APIs, backend services, and data workflows that power firm-wide operations, from transaction processing to investment analytics, primarily within a Ruby on Rails environment.
• Scale what matters. Architect and optimize data-intensive applications for performance, reliability, and efficiency, because at Stronghold, speed and accuracy aren't nice-to-haves, they're the business.
• Shape the platform. Collaborate with senior engineers, product teams, front-end developers, and other cross-functional stakeholders on system architecture and long-term technical design, contributing to decisions that will define how the firm operates for years.
• Own the pipeline. Build and maintain automated and event-driven data processing pipelines using technologies such as Kafka to keep information accurate, consistent, and moving, the kind of infrastructure the investment team depends on daily.
• Write code that lasts. Deliver clean, testable, maintainable code with a strong point of view on scalability, and back it up through thoughtful code reviews, testing, and CI/CD practices.
• Make the database fast. Optimize queries, data models, indexing strategies, and schema designs across technologies including PostgreSQL, Redis, and Elasticsearch so nothing slows down the people making decisions with this data.
• Build for the cloud. Develop and support backend applications and services in Microsoft Azure, contributing to scalable cloud architecture and modern deployment practices.
• Keep the lights on, proactively. Implement monitoring, logging, and alerting systems so issues are caught before they become problems.
• Solve the hard stuff. Troubleshoot, debug, and resolve complex system, performance, and data issues across environments, the problems other people have already given up on.
• Improve how we ship. Contribute to CI/CD pipelines, engineering processes, and development practices that allow the team to move quickly without sacrificing quality.
• Move fast as a team. Participate in Agile ceremonies, bringing technical depth to sprint planning and pushing goals forward with the broader engineering team.

Qualifications – What You Bring

• A strong technical foundation. Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, or a related field, or equivalent experience that proves you can do the work.
• 3–6 years of real backend experience. You've built and shipped backend systems, APIs, web applications, and data infrastructure, not just maintained them.
• Ruby on Rails expertise. Strong hands-on experience developing scalable backend applications and services using Ruby on Rails.
• Architectural instincts. You understand how distributed systems behave under pressure, API design, service boundaries, failure modes, and all.
• SQL you're proud of. Deep, hands-on experience with relational databases, particularly PostgreSQL. You know the difference between a query that works and one that scales.
• Experience beyond relational databases. You're comfortable working with technologies such as Redis and Elasticsearch and understand when different data stores are appropriate.
• Experience with event-driven systems. Hands-on experience with Kafka or similar messaging and streaming technologies, including building reliable asynchronous or event-driven workflows.
• Comfort in the cloud. Experience developing and operating applications in cloud environments, preferably Microsoft Azure, with familiarity with Docker and modern containerized deployment practices.
• CI/CD fluency. Experience working with Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery pipelines and modern software development practices.
• Observability mindset. You don't just write code, you instrument it. You know how to build systems you can actually see inside of.
• A track record of solving hard problems. You've hunted down performance bottlenecks, application issues, and scalability challenges and fixed them, and you can talk through how.
• A collaborative approach. You communicate effectively with engineers, product stakeholders, and cross-functional partners, including team members working across locations and time zones.
• The Stronghold standard. Precision, accountability, and a genuine commitment to technical excellence. You hold your own work to a high bar, not because you're asked to, but because you care.

Preferred Qualifications - What Sets You Apart

• Oil & Gas, Financial Services, Real Assets, or Fintech experience is a significant plus.
• Broader data-store experience , including SQL Server and MongoDB.
• Data processing experience with libraries or frameworks such as Pandas, NumPy, or Polars.
• Strong adoption of AI tools , with demonstrated knowledge and practical experience using AI in development workflows.

Why Stronghold

At Stronghold, we strive to create a workplace that is not only rewarding but also satisfying. We believe our employees are the driving force behind our success, and we are committed to providing them with an environment where they can thrive and reach their full potential. When you choose to work with us, you'll be joining a team of highly talented professionals who are passionate about what they do and dedicated to bringing technology expertise to our domain. We value innovation, collaboration, and a commitment to excellence, and we provide our employees with the resources and support they need to succeed.

Our Investment in You

• Market-competitive compensation
• Fully paid benefits (Medical, Dental and Vision)
• Flexible Spending Account (FSA)
• Health Savings Account (HSA)
• 401k + Match
• Company sponsored LTD, STD, life insurance and AD&D
• Generous PTO policy
• Exemplary holiday observance
• Parental Leave
• Class A offices in prime locations

Equal Opportunity Employer
Stronghold Investment Management is an equal opportunity employer. We believe in creating a diverse and inclusive workforce, where individuals of all backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives can thrive. We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws. We encourage applicants from underrepresented groups to apply and embrace the unique contributions they can bring to our organization.