Sr. Rails Engineer

Who you are

The Senior Rails Engineer should be seen as a rock-solid engineer who is a master of Ruby, Rails, and web development in general. The Senior Engineer is capable of owning technical design for projects of moderate complexity, and understands the tradeoffs in creating good software. They hold a depth of knowledge in systems that enables them to debug those systems effectively without flailing. In addition to writing consistently high-quality code they are aware of industry best practices and trends, and have acquired at least one major specialty such as performance optimization, testing, API design, frontend development, or project management.

The Senior Engineer gets a lot done. They are responsible for complex tasks and complete them despite roadblocks, grabbing others for help or insight as necessary. The Senior Engineer requires very little oversight beyond high-level direction; they can take a complex user story, break it down into sub-tasks, and complete their sub-tasks with relative ease. The Senior Engineer shows initiative beyond knocking tasks off a list; they are able to identify and suggest areas of future work for themselves or their teams. They seek evidence to support their ideas and start to build cases for these ideas. They deliver products to QA that they believe are well-baked and bug-free.

The Senior Engineer has end-to-end responsibility for projects of increasing complexity that encompass more than their own development. They contribute to the common code bases and standards for the team. They understand the business that their code supports, and possess empathy for the users of their software; they use this understanding to influence their task prioritization. They assist QA in identifying and validating test cases and can identify regression risks in their features. In general, they can identify risks in code, features, and design, and communicate these to the appropriate parties.

The Senior Engineer is known outside of their core team as a technology leader. They participate extensively in code reviews, and mentor others via code reviews and pairing. They work effectively with non-tech members of the company. They are able to identify problems with requirements and help their team course-correct around these issues.

Above all, they want to build something that fundamentally improves the lives of families.

What we’re looking for

Qualifications

• 3+ years experience with Ruby on Rails
• 5+ years of professional software engineering
• Advanced experience with PostgreSQL or MySQL
• A thirst for knowledge and continuous learning
• Ability to unblock themselves and other team members
• Excellent communication skills with technical and non-technical teammates and showed a high level of emotional and professional maturity.
• Succeeded as an engineer when presented with projects of increasing complexity over time across multiple areas or domains of the code/product
• Earned a high level of trust amongst team to own a task/project without needing much supervision
• Demonstrated ability to anticipate how contributions can affect larger architecture, developing risk mitigation and contingency plans
• A high level of craftsmanship about your work, the end experience of the user, and impact on overall product
• A connection to HopSkipDrive’s mission and values

Primary Responsibilities

• Communicate well with all members of the team
• Perform well-defined engineering tasks; doesn’t get caught up in the unknown, works to figure it out, asks questions
• Alert manager/team to any issues preventing your work from being accomplished, asks for help
• Actively pursue improving engineering skills, including but not limited to problem solving, writing readable/testable/efficient code, mastering technology in our stack, and learning to anticipate scaling issues.
• Contribute meaningfully to the definition of user stories
• Seek to tie stories back to user value & impact for our drivers and organizers
• Deconstruct a problem into an executable action plan for yourself and other engineers - also perform them to high quality
• Own and complete full projects beginning with identifying and communicating the problems to be solved, getting and incorporating feedback on proposed architectural solutions, and making a final decision as the owner of a project.
• Lean into challenges when they offer the potential to create large impact, and do so with productivity and positivity
• Be highly productive - have a reputation for getting things done quickly and efficiently
• Make sure your code is readable & easy to maintain
• Make sure your code is tested appropriately
• Review other engineers’ code and provide constructive feedback
• Monitor changes in production and rollback if necessary
• Have production access and use it responsibly
• Be able to dive in to any area of the code/product that you are not familiar with and make changes, guide others in how to do this
• Show curiosity to not only learn new things but fully understand how they work
• Be a mentor for other engineers
• Set and maintain high individual and team expectations
• Be able to communicate well with all engineers regardless of seniority
• Monitor the outcomes of the team’s actions to learn from mistakes and replicate successes
• Interview prospective candidates and provide thoughtful evaluations and feedback

** This role will be fully remote from a state where we do business  AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, IL, KS, MD, WI, NC, NV, NJ, NY, OR, TX, SC, VA, MI, WA, MO, TN, NM**

What you will get

We want you to be an owner in our company and share in executing our vision, so every full-time employee has equity.  In addition, we offer  flexible vacation, medical, dental, vision and life insurance, 401(k), FSA, and an opportunity to work for a uniquely positioned, VC-backed company in a hugely attractive space with significant upside potential. HopSkipDrive is committed to fair and equitable compensation practices. The salary range for this role in Los Angeles, CA is $160,000 to $175,000. This position is remote and, as such, compensation will ultimately be in line with the location in which the position is filled. Final compensation for this role will be determined by several factors such as a candidate’s relevant work experience, skill set, certifications, and specific work location. The total compensation package for this role also includes equity stock options.