Staff Software Engineer - Byte at KFC

Job description

We are searching for an experienced Staff Software Engineer who can own both hands-on technical delivery and the technical leadership of our Android engineering work. In this role, you will drive the architecture and implementation of both consumer-facing and enterprise operational applications for the restaurant industry. Our platform runs globally across Taco Bell, KFC and Pizza Hut using peer-to-peer replication, network service discovery, and embedded web servers to keep restaurants running even when the network doesn’t — all built on a 100% Kotlin codebase with a modern Android stack including Jetpack Compose. As a Staff Software Engineer, you will set technical direction within your area of the platform, mentor engineers across the team, lead how we apply AI tooling in our development practices, and guide technical activities to ensure our users’ and brands’ needs are met. Your day-to-day: • Technical Leadership and Mentorship: • Serve as a technical leader for the Android platform. Set patterns, review designs and code, and raise the engineering bar across your workstreams. • Mentor and coach your fellow engineers and act as a thought leader on the product. • Champion AI-assisted development on the team: establish patterns and guardrails for AI tool usage across development, testing, documentation and support, while keeping clear expectations for quality, security and engineer ownership. • Lead by example within an agile development process that adds incremental value to the platform with each iteration. • Problem Solving: • Architect and build core platform capabilities, including peer-to-peer replication, real-time syncing, distributed transactions and offline resilience. • Interface with and support a myriad of hardware devices — printers, payment terminals and scanners — while building clean abstractions around them. • Own performance and reliability for an always-on application that runs all day long in tens of thousands of restaurants worldwide. • Implement and uphold MVVM architecture patterns and comprehensive testing strategies to keep the codebase clean, testable and maintainable. • Solve both ambiguous and complex problems with real risk, working alongside cross-functional teams. • Communication and Influence: • Interact frequently with engineering leadership, product management and brand teams to align on technical direction, roadmap tradeoffs and delivery risks. • Communicate complex topics/problems in an articulate manner. • Collaborate with product management, other engineering teams, quality assurance, operations, and other functions to develop the right solutions. • Help build the kind of team culture where engineers are excited to show up to work. You should have: • BA/BS or higher in Computer Science or a related STEM field. • 8+ years hands-on experience building robust mobile software, including deep production Android experience. • Expert knowledge of the Android SDK and strong working knowledge of modern Android concepts, including Kotlin and Jetpack Compose. • Published native Android apps in your portfolio. • A proven history of writing robust software, including a solid grasp of and respect for proper architectures and testing strategies. • Experience architecting and building libraries, SDKs and tools for internal and external consumption. • AI dev tooling embedded in your day-to-day, not just experimenting, with enough judgment to set patterns and mentor other engineers on using it safely and effectively. • Ability to self-direct, prioritize work for other developers, and lead and mentor your fellow engineers. • Willingness and ability to own/manage specific aspects of the development process including implementation, testing, or deployment (CI/CD). We prefer: • Exposure to distributed systems and peer-to-peer architecture. • Restaurant tech, retail POS, or any in-store operational system background. • Strong background in reactive UI patterns (Kotlin Flow/Coroutines, Jetpack Compose); RxJava experience also translates well. • Experience building payment systems and integrating with hardware peripherals including printers and payment terminals. • Experience with both SQL and NoSQL databases, and knowledge of their tradeoffs. • Experience customizing the Android OS and deploying it on x86 hardware. • Startup experience. • Social proof of your passion for software development (blog, personal apps or websites, meetup presentations, community involvement). Some of our perks: • 4 weeks of vacation plus holidays. • 5 sick days. • 2 paid volunteer days. • Company-wide recharge holidays. • 401(k) matching. • Medical, dental, vision. • Life insurance. • Half-day Fridays. • Generous parental leave. • A world-famous recognition culture. Salary Range: $148,900 to $186,500 annually + bonus eligibility. This is the expected salary range for this position. Ultimately, in determining pay, we'll consider the successful candidate’s location, experience, and other job-related factors. We are searching for an experienced Staff Software Engineer who can own both hands-on technical delivery and the technical leadership of our Android engineering work.

Requirements

Must-haves

Serve as a technical leader for the Android platform. Set patterns, review designs and code, and raise the engineering bar across your workstreams.
Mentor and coach your fellow engineers and act as a thought leader on the product.
Lead by example within an agile development process that adds incremental value to the platform with each iteration.
Architect and build core platform capabilities, including peer-to-peer replication, real-time syncing, distributed transactions and offline resilience.
Interface with and support a myriad of hardware devices — printers, payment terminals and scanners — while building clean abstractions around them.
Own performance and reliability for an always-on application that runs all day long in tens of thousands of restaurants worldwide.
Implement and uphold MVVM architecture patterns and comprehensive testing strategies to keep the codebase clean, testable and maintainable.
Solve both ambiguous and complex problems with real risk, working alongside cross-functional teams.
Interact frequently with engineering leadership, product management and brand teams to align on technical direction, roadmap tradeoffs and delivery risks.
Communicate complex topics/problems in an articulate manner.
Collaborate with product management, other engineering teams, quality assurance, operations, and other functions to develop the right solutions.
Help build the kind of team culture where engineers are excited to show up to work.
BA/BS or higher in Computer Science or a related STEM field.
8+ years hands-on experience building robust mobile software, including deep production Android experience.
Expert knowledge of the Android SDK and strong working knowledge of modern Android concepts, including Kotlin and Jetpack Compose.
Published native Android apps in your portfolio.
A proven history of writing robust software, including a solid grasp of and respect for proper architectures and testing strategies.
Experience architecting and building libraries, SDKs and tools for internal and external consumption.
AI dev tooling embedded in your day-to-day, not just experimenting, with enough judgment to set patterns and mentor other engineers on using it safely and effectively.
Ability to self-direct, prioritize work for other developers, and lead and mentor your fellow engineers.
Willingness and ability to own/manage specific aspects of the development process including implementation, testing, or deployment (CI/CD).
Exposure to distributed systems and peer-to-peer architecture.
Restaurant tech, retail POS, or any in-store operational system background.
Strong background in reactive UI patterns (Kotlin Flow/Coroutines, Jetpack Compose); RxJava experience also translates well.

Nice-to-haves

None flagged.

Application prep

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Keywords to mirror

kotlinaiagileci/cdsql

Platform: oracle-cloud
Effort: medium

Benefits

Benefits detected in the listing.

Dental

Vision

401(K)

Parental Leave