Staff Backend Software Engineer - Remote (Portugal)

Who we are looking for:

You can use agentic workflows (Claude Code, Cursor Agent, or equivalent) as your default, not as a novelty.

You practice context engineering, not just prompt engineering;  you design the full information architecture an AI agent needs to succeed: repo structure, CLAUDE.md / AGENTS.md configs, relevant code context, memory, and tool access.

You understand model routing trade-offs (e.g., when to use Haiku vs. Sonnet vs. Opus) and multi-agent orchestration.

Strong ownership instinct: AI output is a first draft, not a deliverable; you validate, refactor, and take full accountability.

You have strong Coding and Computer Science Fundamentals. Roughly ⅔ of your time will be hands-on technical work: designing solutions, steering and reviewing AI-generated code, developing new ideas, and reviewing others' contributions. The rest goes to cross-team influence, mentoring, and strategic alignment.

Strong background experience in Golang, Java/Kotlin (preferred technologies), and able to work with PHP. Flexible and capable of adjusting to changing project requirements, roles, and backend technologies as needed.

Scalable Systems Expertise. Experience with large-scale web applications, an economic-thinking mindset, and being able to design well-bounded future-proof domain systems, aligned with the business objectives.

Deep expertise in scalable distributed systems, CI/CD, RESTful and GraphQL APIs, AWS, and relational + NoSQL databases.

Big-picture thinker: aligns technical decisions with business strategy, influences without authority.

Clear communicator in English across engineering, product, and leadership audiences.

Self-starter who identifies what needs doing and takes initiative without waiting to be asked.

Skilled Technical Leader and Mentor: Guide and support engineers by setting a strong example. As a Staff Engineer, you are a role model, leading by example and through your expertise.

What you will be doing:

Architect context pipelines for AI agents: curate what enters the context window (repo boundaries, domain knowledge, test outputs, CI feedback) so agents produce reliable, mergeable code, not just plausible code.

Prepare task specifications that are agent-actionable (clear acceptance criteria, referenced modules, explicit constraints)

Design and maintain agent-ready systems: well-bounded repos, comprehensive test suites as guardrails, CI/CD pipelines with structured output agents can parse and act on.

Serve as an AI Champion: join and strengthen our growing AI Champion community, contribute to workshops, curate effective agentic workflows, and mentor engineers on AI-assisted practices. Contribute to org-level AI tooling evaluations and OLX AI practices repositories.

Drive active migration from a legacy monolith to microservices, owning decisions on bounded domain decomposition. Working on making agentic workflows effective across a codebase whose boundaries are actively being redefined.

Set the bar for GraphQL API design, RESTful contracts, database schema, and CI/CD quality across the tribe.

Work with product and engineering leadership to identify high-value problems, propose initiatives, and drive impactful technical direction without direct authority

Guide senior engineers in managing and reducing technical debt with AI as an accelerator, not a shortcut.

Our Hiring Process:

Recruiter Interview 

Managemnent Capabilities

System Design

Live Coding

Our Benefits

Permanent contract
Salary + annual bonus up to 20% of your annual gross salary
Work with and impact all OLX websites around the world
Train and conference budget, and free access to Udemy courses
Health insurance and life insurance
MacBook Pro or a Windows Dell, along with the necessary accessories to make your work comfortable
100% remote work (and the possibility to work from our office in Lisboa)