Staff Software Engineer
First seen by Alion on Sep 16, 2026.
Welcome to the Agentic Commerce Era
At Commerce, our mission is to empower businesses to innovate, grow, and thrive with our open, AI-driven commerce ecosystem. As the parent company of BigCommerce, Feedonomics, and Makeswift, we connect the tools and systems that power growth, enabling businesses to unlock the full potential of their data, deliver seamless and personalized experiences across every channel, and adapt swiftly to an ever-changing market. We believe in harnessing AI responsibly to unlock new possibilities, and we’re looking for individuals who use it intentionally to solve problems, accelerate outcomes, and expand what’s possible in their role. Our purpose is to help businesses confidently solve complex commerce challenges so they can build smarter, adapt faster, and grow on their own terms. If you want to be part of a team of bold builders, sharp thinkers, and technical trailblazers who shape the future of commerce, this is the place for you.
The Staff Software Engineer is a senior technical leader within the Engineering organization, responsible for influencing architectural direction across multiple domains and ensuring our platform scales efficiently and securely for over 60,000 merchants worldwide.
In this role you will lead the design, development, and evolution of large-scale distributed systems while helping shape how AI technologies including machine learning models and GenAI solutions, are integrated into our current and future products. You will guide teams toward high-impact technical solutions, mentor senior engineers, and contribute directly to building innovative, reliable systems that power the Commerce platform.
This role is highly collaborative. You will partner closely with product managers, designers, and engineering leaders across global offices to ensure shared context, customer-focused decisions, and continuous learning within our engineering culture.
BigCommerce, part of the Commerce brand family, helps merchants increase sales at every stage of their growth. From small startups to mid-market businesses and large enterprises, we provide the leading e-commerce platform. Our customers can then concentrate on what's most important: growing their businesses. We enable our customers to build, innovate, and grow, collectively reshaping the e-commerce industry.
What You’ll Do
Technical Direction & Architecture
Lead the design, development, and evolution of scalable, reliable, high-performance distributed systems
Drive architectural discussions that span multiple domains across the platform, and participate in cross-domain architectural working groups
Contribute to the definition and execution of our long-term technical roadmap
Ensure technical decisions align with goals of performance, scalability, reliability, security, and maintainability
AI & Emerging Technology
Drive initiatives to integrate AI technologies, including machine learning models and GenAI solutions, into existing and future products
Evaluate emerging AI infrastructure and development practices, and advocate for adoption where they deliver clear customer or engineering value
Stay abreast of advancements in distributed systems, cloud technologies, and artificial intelligence, and share that knowledge across teams
Engineering Excellence
Build and maintain high-performance, reliable, and secure software systems.
Lead by example in writing testable, maintainable code that meets high quality standards
Participate in and lead in-depth code reviews, advocating for best practices that improve software quality and reliability
Identify and address performance bottlenecks, scalability challenges, and system reliability issues
Build tools and frameworks that enable faster, safer delivery of value by other engineers
Collaboration & Mentorship
Collaborate effectively with software engineers, product managers, designers, and stakeholders across global teams to translate business requirements into technical solutions
Provide technical leadership and mentorship to engineers at all levels
Promote a culture of knowledge sharing, continuous improvement, and mentorship across teams
Who You Are
Minimum of 10 years of professional software engineering experience delivering production systems
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field (or equivalent practical experience), plus 10+ years of professional software development experience with demonstrated leadership in technical direction and architecture
Expertise in back-end development with two or more server-side languages (e.g., PHP, Go, Scala, Java, Python, Ruby)
Proven experience in architecting, building, and maintaining large-scale distributed systems
Strong understanding of distributed systems concepts, including consensus, consistency, and fault tolerance
Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or similar) and microservices architecture
Solid experience with SQL, in-memory storage, and other data storage solutions
Experience operating and monitoring services in production, including familiarity with observability tooling (e.g., Sentry, Kibana, Datadog)
Solid grasp of software design principles, testing strategies, and modern development practices
Strong problem-solving and debugging skills
Excellent communication skills and able to articulate design decisions and rationale across technical and non-technical audiences
Proven track record of technical leadership and mentorship
Comfortable navigating ambiguity and driving clarity across complex initiatives
Passionate about learning, teaching, and promoting engineering excellence
Preferred Qualifications
Experience building product solutions with LLMs and GenAI technologies
Familiarity with modern AI infrastructure, such as vector databases, model orchestration tools, inference frameworks, and cloud-native ML workflows
Experience with SaaS or multi-tenant platforms operating at significant scale
Work Where You Thrive
For candidates based in the Austin or Atlanta metro area, the position follows a hybrid work model with three days per week in the office, balancing focused individual work with meaningful in-person collaboration.
(Pay Transparency Range: $186,000.00 - $280,000.00)
Compensation Transparency
The national base salary range for this role is posted above in this job post.
Final compensation will be determined based on factors such as relevant experience, skills, qualifications and geographic location. We also consider internal equity to help ensure fair and consistent pay practices across our teams.
Where applicable, this role may also be eligible for variable compensation (such as bonus or commission), equity, and benefits in accordance with local policies. Details will be shared during the hiring process. We are committed to equitable and transparent pay practices that align to market data, internal equity, and individual contribution.
Inclusion and Belonging
At Commerce, we believe that celebrating the unique histories, perspectives and abilities of every employee makes a difference for our company, our customers and our community. We are an equal opportunity employer and the inclusive atmosphere we build together will make room for every person to contribute, grow and thrive.
We are committed to creating an inclusive and accessible hiring experience for all candidates. If you require accommodations or adjustments at any stage of the recruitment process, please let us know and we will work with you to meet your needs.
Learn more about the Commerce team, culture and benefits at https://www.commerce.com/careers/
Identity Verification
To protect our candidates and company from fraudulent activity, our interview process includes a government ID and biometric verification via Persona, our trusted identity verification provider. All information is collected and processed securely in accordance with applicable privacy laws.
Protect Yourself Against Hiring Scams: Our Corporate Disclaimer
Commerce, along with many other employers, has become the subject of fraudulent job offers to hopeful prospective job seekers.
Be advised:
Commerce does not offer jobs to individuals who do not go through our formal hiring process.
Commerce will never:
- require payment of recruitment fees from candidates;
- request personally identifiable information through unsanctioned websites or applications;
- attempt to solicit money from you as part of the hiring process or as part of an employment offer;
- solicit money to complete visa requirements as part of a job offer.
If you receive unsolicited offers of employment from Commerce, we urge you to be extremely cautious and avoid engaging or responding.