Staff Software Engineer - Search Platform

Rippling · Seattle, WA · 5 days ago

On-siteInformation TechnologyFull-time

Rippling provides a unified platform for managing HR, IT, and Finance operations. Key features include:

Onboarding: Set up payroll, corporate cards, computers, benefits, and third-party apps within 90 seconds.
Company Location: Based in San Francisco, CA.
Funding: Raised $1.4B+ from top investors including Kleiner Perkins, Founders Fund, Sequoia, Greenoaks, and Bedrock.
Candidate Safety: Ensures all official communication comes from @Rippling.com addresses.

Define and lead the technical vision for Rippling search systems: indexing pipelines, query serving, ranking/relevance, and retrieval quality measurement.
Tackle open-ended challenges in hybrid retrieval, semantic/vector search, and metadata ranking to push the boundaries of our platform.
Build and operate resilient, high-performance infrastructure (OpenSearch/Elasticsearch) capable of supporting 10x scale growth while maintaining rigorous standards for latency, freshness, correctness, and cost-efficiency.
Define relevance strategy and evaluation: offline benchmarks, quality metrics, and production monitoring.
Build reusable search platform abstractions used by multiple Rippling products.
Elevate the entire engineering organization through strategic design reviews, mentorship, and the establishment of "best-in-class" operational standards.

8+ years in backend/platform engineering with ownership of distributed systems in production.
Deep experience in search infrastructure (OpenSearch/Elasticsearch/Solr/Lucene-style systems), indexing, and relevance tuning.
Strong systems design fundamentals: storage/index design, query execution, performance optimization, and reliability engineering.
Experience with data platforms and schema-rich systems, including large-scale ingestion and serving paths.
Proficiency in at least one backend language (Python, Go, or Java).
Strong cross-functional execution and ability to lead ambiguous multi-team platform initiatives.
Hybrid retrieval, semantic/vector search, or ML-assisted ranking experience.
Experience with analytics/query ecosystems (e.g., Trino/Presto, Kafka, Iceberg, Spark).
Experience building discoverability products such as catalog search, field selection, metadata ranking.

8+ years in backend/platform engineering with ownership of distributed systems in production.
Deep experience in search infrastructure (OpenSearch/Elasticsearch/Solr/Lucene-style systems), indexing, and relevance tuning.
Strong systems design fundamentals: storage/index design, query execution, performance optimization, and reliability engineering.
Experience with data platforms and schema-rich systems, including large-scale ingestion and serving paths.
Proficiency in at least one backend language (Python, Go, or Java).
Strong cross-functional execution and ability to lead ambiguous multi-team platform initiatives.
Hybrid retrieval, semantic/vector search, or ML-assisted ranking experience.
Experience with analytics/query ecosystems (e.g., Trino/Presto, Kafka, Iceberg, Spark).
Experience building discoverability products such as catalog search, field selection, metadata ranking.

Equal Opportunity Employer: Rippling is committed to building a diverse and inclusive workforce and does not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, sexual orientation, veteran or military status, or any other legally protected characteristics.
Reasonable Accommodations: Requests for reasonable accommodations will be considered.
Office-Based Employees: Office-based employees must work at least three days a week.

Competitive salary + benefits + equity.
Salary range for US-based employees: 189,000 - 315,000 USD per year (US Tier 1).

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