Staff Engineer

Role Description

We are seeking a Staff Engineer to join one of the engineering teams building KnowBe4's core Security Awareness Training product. This is a full-stack role requiring depth across a Ruby on Rails backend, modern front-end technologies (Vue 3, SvelteKit), and complex AWS infrastructure.

As a Staff Engineer, you are a technical leader in day-to-day engineering. You drive direction through architectural ownership of the systems your team builds, high-impact code contributions, and cross-team influence.

You'll work within a platform ecosystem of microservices deployed across our AWS regions, helping ensure we meet rigorous FedRAMP Moderate, SOC 2, and ISO 27001 standards. Our front-end is actively evolving — we're rewriting our micro-frontends (MFEs) to Vue 3 — so you'll both shape that migration and keep our current SvelteKit application healthy. You lead through your engineering, your judgment, and your ability to bring other engineers along with you.

What You'll Build

• Full-stack product features and subsystems:
  • Ruby on Rails APIs, GraphQL endpoints, and Vue 3 / SvelteKit + TypeScript front-ends that ship real value to a global customer base
• The Vue 3 front-end direction:
  • Owning key parts of the micro-frontend (MFE) rewrite onto Vue 3, setting patterns others build on, while keeping the existing SvelteKit application maintainable
• GraphQL APIs at scale:
  • Schema design, batch loading, and query complexity management for high-traffic, multi-tenant access patterns
• Event-driven services:
  • EventBridge/SQS-based communication between microservices, with an emphasis on idempotency, reliability, and asynchronous processing at scale
• Serverless background processing:
  • Evolving and optimizing our Lambda-backed worker framework (400+ workers) that powers the product's async workload
• Multi-tenant data strategy:
  • Architecting patterns across MySQL, PostgreSQL, DynamoDB, and Redis while maintaining strict tenant isolation and compliance guarantees
• Infrastructure-as-Code:
  • Terraform modules and GitLab CI/CD pipelines that provision and deploy services across multiple environments and regions
• Technical direction:
  • Architecture reviews, Architecture Decision Records (ADRs), and cross-team coordination on changes that reach beyond a single service

Essential Responsibilities

• Develops software using the KnowBe4 Software Development Lifecycle and Agile methodologies
• Assists other team members by providing technical direction
• Defines approaches and solutions to complex technical problems
• Owns the evolution of major subsystems within the team's domain
• Translates KnowBe4's strategic goals into technical roadmaps in collaboration with Product, Security, and Infrastructure teams
• Sets the bar for code quality and engineering patterns through rigorous reviews and technical guidance for senior engineers
• May act as technical lead for larger sub-projects or entire small projects

Skills Requirements

• Backend & Systems —
  • 5+ years scaling production Ruby on Rails applications; expertise in GraphQL (batch loading, complexity management) and relational databases tuning (MySQL/PostgreSQL) for high-traffic, multi-tenant systems
• Frontend —
  • Strong proficiency with a modern component framework and strict TypeScript; Vue 3 experience is preferred given our MFE direction, and SvelteKit experience is highly valued for our current codebase (React also translates well); proven ability to lead large-scale front-end work using Vite and Tailwind CSS
• Cloud —
  • Deep experience with AWS (ECS/Fargate, Lambda, EventBridge, SQS, S3); strong proficiency with Terraform for Infrastructure-as-Code and GitLab CI/CD
• Distributed Systems —
  • Experience designing event-driven architectures and managing asynchronous processing at scale; sound judgment on eventual consistency, idempotency, and failure handling
• Technical Leadership —
  • Demonstrated experience at the Staff level: writing ADRs, driving design across a team, and building for compliance-regulated environments (FedRAMP / SOC 2 / ISO 27001)
• AI-assisted development —
  • Comfortable using modern AI coding tools (e.g., Claude / Claude Code) to accelerate delivery, review, and problem-solving; we actively embrace these tools and value engineers who use them thoughtfully to raise both speed and quality, and who help their teams do the same

Preferred / Nice-to-Have

• Experience leading a front-end framework migration end-to-end
• Deep experience scaling production Rails under real traffic
• Serverless background-processing frameworks at scale
• DynamoDB / Redis data modeling for high-throughput workloads
• Familiarity with compliance-regulated environments (FedRAMP, SOC 2, ISO 27001)
• Track record of integrating AI tooling into team engineering workflows (code generation, review, test scaffolding, automation)

Education & Experience

• BS or equivalent plus 10 years of experience
• MS or equivalent plus 5 years of experience
• Ph.D. or equivalent plus 4 years of experience

Salary

The salary for this position ranges from $170,000-$190,000, which will vary depending on how well an applicant's skills and experience align with the job description listed above.

Application Deadline

Application deadline: 9/22/2026. This is our good-faith estimate of the date the application window is anticipated to close. KnowBe4 reviews applications on a rolling basis and reserves the right to close the application window early if a qualified candidate for the position is identified.

Benefits

• Company-wide bonuses based on monthly sales targets
• Employee referral bonuses
• Adoption assistance
• Tuition reimbursement
• Certification reimbursement
• Certification completion bonuses

Company Description

KnowBe4 empowers the modern workforce to make smarter security decisions every day. Trusted by more than 70,000 organizations worldwide, KnowBe4 is the pioneer of digital workforce security, securing both AI agents and humans. The KnowBe4 Platform provides attack simulation and training, collaboration security, and agent security powered by AIDA (Artificial Intelligence Defense Agents) and a proprietary Risk Score. The platform leverages 15-years of behavioral data to combat advanced threats including social engineering, prompt injection, and shadow AI. By securing humans and agents, KnowBe4 leads the industry in workforce trust and defense.