Staff Software Engineer (Data Infrastructure)

Role overview

Join Slack as a Staff Software Engineer (Data Infrastructure). You will design, build, and operate core data services that power Slack’s analytics, machine learning, and data-driven decision-making.

Key missions

• Design, build, and operate reliable and scalable data infrastructure for analytics, ML, and decision-making.
• Act as DRI (directly responsible individual) for multiple core analytics data services (e.g., StarRocks, Pinot, Trino) ensuring uptime, reliability, and smooth operation.
• Own compute and orchestration services (e.g., Airflow, Temporal, EMR, Hive Metastore).
• Drive improvements in security, cost efficiency, and developer experience across the data infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate with data engineering, platform, and security teams to deliver scalable, well-governed data solutions.
• Improve infrastructure reliability, observability, and operational efficiency.

Requirements

• Strong background in big data and infrastructure technologies, including experience with Pinot, StarRocks, Trino, EMR, Airflow, Hive Metastore, Kubernetes (or equivalent systems).
• Ownership mindset and ability to deliver high-impact, autonomous results.
• Proven experience building, deploying, and operating distributed infrastructure at scale.
• Deep understanding of reliability, observability, and cost efficiency.
• Excellent communication and cross-functional collaboration skills.
• 10+ years of software/platform/infrastructure engineering experience, including time supporting data-intensive systems/data platforms.
• U.S. Citizenship or Permanent Residency (Green Card); no visa sponsorship.
• Proficiency in Python, Golang, Bash, and SQL.

Nice to have

• Hands-on experience supporting data pipelines or data engineering workflows.
• Experience with CI/CD (GitHub Actions), Vault, Terraform, Chef, and Grafana.