Staff Backend Engineer (Kotlin/Java)

Join one of our platform teams and help us build the foundations and integrations that power Productboard – a one-of-a-kind product management system used by 5000+ global companies. You will work on technically critical and high-leverage areas like authentication, permissions, platform services, developer experience, and shared infrastructure - all foundational pieces that enable every product team at Productboard to move faster and build more reliably. As a Staff engineer (IC4), you’ll be a force multiplier: unblocking delivery, setting technical direction, and creating systems that raise the bar for engineering velocity and quality across the company. You’ll lead through technical strategy and execution, represent your team in cross-functional forums, and mentor engineers to become more effective. You’ll work closely with PMs and other tech leads to drive platform thinking and pragmatic architectural choices. We value strong Kotlin skills and thoughtful backend design. Ruby experience is a big plus, but more important is your ability to think clearly and adapt - regardless of language. If you’re excited to have outsized impact across teams, and thrive on solving deep technical challenges with clarity and purpose, we’d love to hear from you. This role is primarily based in our Prague or Brno office with an office-centric hybrid schedule. Responsibilities

• Identify and lead high-impact technical initiatives that improve platform scalability, reliability, or developer experience.
• Own complex system design and architectural decisions, collaborating across teams to align technical direction with product needs.
• Unblock your team by simplifying complexity, cutting scope when needed, and delivering pragmatic solutions that accelerate value delivery.
• Proactively tackle tech debt, instability, or bottlenecks that affect multiple teams - and build reusable solutions that serve the whole org.
• Write high-quality Kotlin (or Java) code and establish clear patterns, documentation, and design artifacts others can build on.
• Mentor engineers across levels, supporting their growth through pairing, feedback, and architectural guidance.
• Represent your team in cross-functional initiatives and engineering-wide discussions around architecture, tooling, or quality.
• Improve the reliability, observability, and performance of shared services - and contribute to our incident response practices.

Requirements

• 6+ years of professional experience building and evolving backend systems at scale, ideally on platform or infrastructure teams
• Deep technical expertise in system design, distributed architectures, and scalable backend services
• Strong proficiency in Kotlin or Java; Ruby experience is a plus - but more importantly, you’re language-agnostic and focus on good thinking
• Proven ability to drive cross-team initiatives and technical strategy from concept through delivery
• Experience improving developer experience, CI/CD pipelines, or service reliability across teams
• Strong communication skills and the ability to drive alignment through crisp documentation and design artifacts (e.g. ADRs, RFCs)
• Experience mentoring and elevating engineers by creating systems, standards, and feedback loops that scale
• A pragmatic, impact-driven mindset - you bias toward action and push for solutions that balance quality, scope, and speed
• Bonus: Experience working on authentication, permissions, observability, or similar foundational concerns
• Bonus: Curiosity to explore AI-based tooling for accelerating backend development or automation

Our Tech Stack

• You’ll work with the following frameworks, tools, and languages:
• Frontend: TypeScript, React, GraphQL
• Backend: Kotlin, Ruby, Kafka
• Storage: PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Elastic, Redis
• Data Pipeline: Python, Keboola, Looker, Snowflake
• Infrastructure: AWS, Cloudflare, Kubernetes, Terraform
• Business tools: Slack, Jira, Google suite, Zoom, Notion
• You can see the full tech stack here

You Can Look Forward to the Following Benefits

• Stock options
• MacBook + 34″ monitor
• Budget for online courses, books, and conferences
• 5 weeks of vacation + sick days
• 1 Volunteer Day per year for you to help causes close to your heart
• Carrot Fertility Benefits
• Free snacks, drinks, and yummy catered lunches
• MultiSport card to access sports facilities
• Flexible working hours and home office
• Parental benefits
• Language lessons
• Mental Wellness Program to support your well-being and self-care
• Hone – Live, interactive learning programs for managers, leaders, and teams

About Productboard

At Productboard, we’re on a mission to help product teams build exceptional products with clarity and confidence. As the leading intelligent product management platform, we empower over 4,000 companies, including Salesforce, SAP, Autodesk, and Kroger, to understand what customers need, prioritize what to build next, and align everyone around a shared roadmap. Headquartered in San Francisco with offices in Prague and Brno, Czechia, we’re backed by some of the world’s most respected investors, including Index Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Sequoia Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, Tiger Global, and Dragoneer. We’re proud to be consistently recognized as one of the best places to work by BuiltIn and Comparably, and to count ourselves among the world’s leading unicorn companies. Well-funded and financially disciplined, we have the stability and runway to build boldly for the long term. Over the past few years, we’ve rearchitected our platform from the ground up to serve enterprise scale and set the foundation for the next era of product management. Now we’re entering an exciting new phase with Productboard Spark, our AI-first, agentic experience that transforms how product teams work. Spark is a true collaborator that deeply understands your product context, company strategy, and customer needs, helping teams move faster and make smarter, more confident decisions. Join us as we build the future of product management.

About our culture

Imagine working in a place where everything matters — most importantly, you. At Productboard, values aren’t just something we like to talk about, they’re something we live and breathe. We believe in creating a work environment where:

• People feel empowered, supported, and included
• Trust and transparency are built into the way we work
• Creativity, curiosity, and continuous improvement are encouraged and nurtured every day

Forming our company values was a group effort, with every employee allowed to contribute. From profit-sharing initiatives, like stock options, to open calendars and communication, we don’t waste time on politics or ego. We champion openness by sharing our goals, successes, and failures. Join colleagues who are passionate about what they do. Team members who are invested in their work environment, and the future of Productboard. Help shape our company, culture, and product! Check out our LinkedIn Life page, or listen to our People of Productboard podcast for a real feel of what life is like at Productboard. Equal Opportunity Employer Statement We are an equal opportunity employer and champion equity. We aim to help people from all backgrounds, cultures, and groups realize their full potential at Productboard. We do not tolerate any discrimination or harassment based on gender identity, race, color, religion, age, sexual orientation, non-disqualifying physical or mental disability, national origin, veteran status, or any other bias covered by appropriate law. All aspects of employment, including hiring, training, promotion, and terminations, are based on merit, competence, performance, and business needs. We are committed to an inclusive hiring process and provide all candidates with equal opportunity to demonstrate their abilities. Togetherness is one of our core values, and our Diversity Council helps to ensure that we uphold the values of authenticity, humanity, and diversity to create an environment where every person matters. We are committed to leading by example to drive societal change.