Senior Software Engineer Asynchronous Processing

Team Overview:

The mission of the Asynchronous Processing team is to design build and operate Klaviyo’s high-scale event-driven backbone so that every product team can reliably move data through our systems with confidence no matter the volume. By providing opinionated self-service platforms for queueing and background processing–grounded in technologies like Golang Python Apache Pulsar Kafka SQS AWS and Kubernetes–we enable engineering teams to focus on customer impact while we ensure their workloads are fast observable cost-efficient and resilient by default.

As a Senior Platform Engineer on the Asynchronous Processing team you will architect build and operate the large-scale event-driven backbone that powers Klaviyo crafting paved-path primitives on top of Golang Python Apache Pulsar Kafka and SQS running in AWS and Kubernetes. You’ll design and evolve resilient multi-tenant queueing and processing platforms that safely handle massive spikes in traffic process millions of messages per second with low latency and provide simple self-service APIs and tooling that enable product teams to move fast and with confidence. From core data models and routing patterns to observability autoscaling and failure isolation you’ll own systems that must be rock solid at scale partnering closely with engineers across the company to turn complex distributed-systems problems into intuitive reliable building blocks.

This role is for senior engineers who love taming large-scale distributed systems and turning real-world asynchronous workloads into reliable scalable platforms. You’ll work on highly visible infrastructure at the heart of Klaviyo’s event-driven backbone directly shaping how thousands of Klaviyos build ship and operate products every day.

How You’ll Make an Impact:

The Asynchronous Processing team builds and operates Klaviyo’s high-scale event-driven backbone that powers reliable low-latency async workloads for every product team. As a Senior Platform Engineer on the Asynchronous Processing team you will:

• Build a deep understanding of engineering needs across the organization guiding the design and development of appropriate platform primitives in queueing that align with the platform's vision and practically empower product teams.
• Design develop and deliver software to dramatically improve the availability scalability latency and efficiency of Klaviyo's asynchronous and queueing services.
• Design and develop systems and processes that enable highly available & scalable systems with a focus on asynchronous processing.
• Leverage technology such as Python Golang AWS and Kubernetes to advance Klaviyo's platform with a deep focus on Apache Pulsar SQS and Kafka. 
• Champion best practices by actively collaborating with other teams in a culture that values technical design review.
• Mentor and pair with other Klaviyo engineers to build better software by focusing on performance self-healing systems configuration as code and defensive programming.
• Participate in periodic on-call duties with a focus on solving issues when they are discovered preventing recurrences and minimizing alert fatigue.

• You are passionate about building software effectively and for the long term balancing technical quality velocity and business impact.
• BA or BS Degree in Computer Science related field or equivalent experience.
• You typically bring 6+ years of hands-on software development experience building and operating highly available full-stack SaaS products at scale or have demonstrated equivalent proficiency and impact.
• You are independently responsible for the full lifecycle of complex projects or features including discovery technical design implementation rollout and ongoing maintenance. You provide clear technical direction for others involved.
• You own the operational health of the systems you build including performance reliability and observability. You are comfortable defining and upholding SLOs participating in on-call and driving follow-through on incidents and RCAs.
• Familiarity with cloud infrastructure (AWS preferred) infrastructure-as-code (Terraform) and containerized environments (Kubernetes) including how to design services that run reliably at scale in those environments.
• Expertise and hands-on experience with asynchronous processing and queueing systems like SQS Kafka or Apache Pulsar.
• Ability to handle yourself and complex systems in outage situations and to drive failures to root cause analysis and prevention of future issues.
• You’ve already experimented with AI in work or personal projects and you’re excited to dive in and learn fast. You’re hungry to responsibly explore new AI tools and workflows finding ways to make your work smarter and more efficient.
• You question convention and proactively look for ways to improve whether that’s workflows architecture tooling or team processes. You are intrinsically motivated to drive incremental and step-change improvements that deliver value to the business.
• You are an excellent communicator and collaborator. You lead technical discussions at the project and product-area level write clear technical design documents and RFCs and keep stakeholders aligned on progress risks and trade-offs.
• You mentor and support other engineers offering thoughtful feedback in design and code reviews helping refine specifications and investing in the growth of more junior engineers on the team.
• You enjoy working on small autonomous agile teams shipping early and often pairing with product managers business stakeholders and other engineers to craft better software.

Nice to Have:

• Fundamental understanding of Linux and all layers of the networking stack; you should be confident administering and debugging production Linux systems.
• Practical experience building high availability systems at scale with Apache Pulsar.

Technologies We Use:

Klaviyo’s platform is primarily built with Python and React and runs on AWS. Engineers join us from a wide range of technical backgrounds and are supported in learning our stack. Core technologies include:

• Python / Django / FastAPI / GoLang
• Protobuf
• Apache Pulsar / Apache Kafka / SQS
• AWS / Terraform / Kubernetes / Argo / Istio / Kong

Location & Work Model:

This role is based in Boston Massachusetts and follows a hybrid working model. Klaviyo supports work authorization and relocation for this position.

At Klaviyo we enjoy tackling meaningful engineering challenges and value people who take ownership learn continuously and collaborate openly. We are committed to building inclusive teams and encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds.

Klaviyo is growing fast and we have openings for all skill levels across all of our teams. Learn more about our engineering culture at https://klaviyo.tech

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What We Do

Klaviyo (NYSE: KVYO) is the B2C CRM. Powered by its built-in data platform and AI Klaviyo combines marketing automation analytics and customer service into one unified solution making it easy for businesses to know their customers and grow faster. Klaviyo (CLAY-vee-oh) helps over 183000 brands like Mattel Glossier Daily Harvest and Liquid Death deliver 1:1 experiences at scale improve efficiency and drive revenue.

Why Work With Us

We refer to our employees as ‘Klaviyos’ and we make up a diverse community united around shared values: We’re curious collaborative driven innovative fun and fully ourselves at work. No matter which team you join your work won’t just impact Klaviyo. It’ll help empower our customers and enable creators across the globe to own their destinies.

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