Staff Software Engineer - Data Governance

Plaid2 weeks ago

Location

San Francisco HQ

Type

Full Time

Salary

USD 207,600 – 273,600

Level

Staff

Role

Staff Software Engineer

Posted

Jul 9, 2026

Full TimeStaff

The role

Summary

Staff Software Engineer on Data Governance at Plaid, a fintech infrastructure leader. Lead the technical architecture for enterprise-scale data governance systems that enforce privacy and regulatory compliance across dozens of microservices. Requires 8+ years of distributed systems expertise in Go, Java, or similar languages, with a demonstrated ability to design complex systems, drive cross-functional initiatives, and transform ambiguous compliance requirements into auditable infrastructure solutions.

What you'll do

Architect and Own Data Governance Platform: Establish the technical vision and architecture for Plaid's data-governance platform, making foundational decisions that govern how data flows through the organization. Design distributed backend systems that reliably handle verifiable deletion, data-use restrictions, and cataloging across dozens of microservices operating at company-wide scale. Ensure the architecture prioritizes correctness, auditability, and operational reliability.

Lead Cross-Team Technical Initiatives: Champion multi-quarter, high-impact initiatives from ambiguous privacy and regulatory requirements through successful deployment. Decompose complex compliance challenges into concrete technical solutions, align engineering teams around a shared technical plan, and maintain hands-on involvement in highest-risk implementation areas to ensure correctness.

Drive Design Excellence and Engineering Standards: Conduct rigorous design reviews and establish engineering standards for reliability, correctness, and auditability across data governance systems. Set the technical bar for the team, ensuring designs account for failure modes, data consistency, and compliance verification requirements. Make architectural decisions whose impact spans the entire company.

Cross-Functional Stakeholder Alignment: Partner deeply with Legal, Privacy, Security, and product-engineering teams to translate regulatory obligations and privacy commitments into implementable technical controls. Serve as the technical point of contact for governance concerns raised by other teams, translating policy requirements into platform capabilities that enable downstream adoption.

Technical Leadership and Mentorship: Mentor and elevate engineers on the team, increasing their technical judgment and capability to tackle complex distributed systems problems. Act as a force multiplier by sharing expertise in system design, data consistency patterns, and compliance-aware architecture. Develop the next generation of technical leaders within the data governance function.

What we look for

Technical

Distributed Systems ArchitectureExtensive expertise designing, building, and operating backend distributed systems at scale. Proven ability to architect systems handling terabyte-scale data flows, reasoning about consistency guarantees, failure modes, and recovery strategies. Experience with service-oriented architectures, event-driven systems, and handling cross-service coordination challenges.

Backend Language ProficiencyStrong production experience with Go, Java, Scala, or similar systems programming languages. Deep understanding of language ecosystems, performance characteristics, and libraries relevant to building reliable infrastructure. Demonstrated hands-on capability to implement complex algorithms and system components.

Data Stores and ConsistencyStrong fundamentals in relational and non-relational data stores, transactional semantics, and consistency models. Ability to reason about eventual consistency, distributed transactions, and data durability guarantees. Experience designing systems that maintain correctness across database failures and network partitions.

System Reliability and CorrectnessDeep judgment in reasoning about correctness, failure modes, and recovery strategies in distributed systems. Experience with monitoring, observability, and auditing practices. Ability to design systems that fail gracefully and provide clear verification of their behavior for compliance purposes.

Education

Computer Science or Related FieldBachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or related discipline preferred. However, equivalent professional experience demonstrating strong computer science fundamentals and systems thinking is valued equally.

Experience

Backend Systems Engineering at ScaleTypically 8+ years of professional experience building and operating backend systems serving millions of users or processing terabyte-scale data volumes. Track record of ownership spanning the full lifecycle from design through production operation.

Complex Systems Design LeadershipProven track record leading the design of complex distributed systems and driving multi-quarter initiatives across multiple engineering teams to successful completion. Evidence of turning ambiguous requirements into clear technical specifications and rallying stakeholders around architectural decisions.

Cross-Functional Technical LeadershipDemonstrated ability to communicate complex technical concepts to non-engineering stakeholders including product, legal, compliance, and security teams. Track record of successfully translating policy and regulatory requirements into technical requirements and implementation plans.

Skills

Required skills

Distributed Systems DesignExpert-level capability designing fault-tolerant distributed systems with complex failure modes. Deep understanding of consensus algorithms, replication strategies, and handling partial failures in microservice architectures.

Backend Programming LanguagesProduction mastery of Go, Java, Scala, or similar statically-typed systems languages. Ability to write high-performance, maintainable code and make language-appropriate architectural decisions.

System Architecture and DesignAbility to make foundational architectural decisions for large-scale systems, considering scalability, reliability, cost, and operational complexity. Experience with designing systems serving millions of users or handling petabyte-scale data.

Database and Data System ExpertiseDeep knowledge of relational databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL, Oracle), NoSQL systems (Cassandra, DynamoDB, MongoDB), and message queues (Kafka). Understanding of consistency guarantees, replication, and failure recovery in each category.

Cross-Functional CommunicationExceptional written and verbal communication skills to translate between technical and non-technical stakeholders. Ability to distill complex system behavior into clear, actionable insights for Legal, Privacy, Security, and compliance partners.

Requirement DecompositionTalent for taking ambiguous, high-level requirements from non-technical stakeholders and decomposing them into clear technical specifications. Ability to ask clarifying questions that expose hidden complexity and tradeoffs early.

Nice to have

Data Privacy and Governance ExperiencePrior experience building systems that enforce data privacy, governance, or compliance requirements. Familiarity with GDPR, CCPA, or other regulatory frameworks and their technical implications for data handling.

Data Deletion and Verification SystemsExperience designing verifiable data deletion mechanisms, ensuring consumers can request deletion and systems can prove deletion has occurred. Knowledge of challenges in proving deletion across replicated data stores and backup systems.

Data Cataloging and Classification SystemsExperience building or operating data catalogs, data lineage tracking, or data classification systems that help organizations understand their data assets and enforce data governance policies.

Data Consent and Restriction EnforcementExperience building systems that enforce data-use restrictions and consent requirements, ensuring data can only be accessed or used in permitted ways. Familiarity with consent management platforms and policy enforcement engines.

Compliance and Audit SystemsExperience building systems that provide auditability and compliance verification. Familiarity with designing systems that can prove their behavior meets regulatory requirements through logs, traces, and other evidence.

Fintech or Financial Services Domain KnowledgePrior experience in fintech, banking, or financial services industries. Understanding of the financial ecosystem, regulatory environment (SOX, PCI-DSS, banking regulations), and data handling requirements in this sector.

Compensation & benefits

Salary

USD 207,600 – 273,600 (annual)

Stock options

Available

Benefits

Comprehensive Health Coverage

Medical, dental, and vision insurance plans with competitive premiums and coverage options designed to support employee wellbeing and that of their dependents.

401(k) Retirement Plan

Company-sponsored 401(k) retirement savings plan, enabling employees to save for long-term financial security with potential company matching contributions.

Equity Compensation

Stock option grants providing employees with ownership stakes in Plaid's future success. Equity compensation aligns employee and company interests and enables wealth building for long-term contributors.

Flexible Work Environment

Work arrangement flexibility supporting productivity and work-life balance. Plaid supports distributed teams and provides flexibility to structure work in ways that maximize effectiveness.

Professional Development

Investment in ongoing learning including conference attendance, training programs, and internal education initiatives. Strong commitment to leveling up technical skills and leadership capability across the organization.

Inclusive Workplace Culture

Commitment to building a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace. Plaid actively recruits and supports underrepresented groups in technology and provides resources for belonging and community.

Interview process

1
Initial Screening and Technical Discussion — Conversation with recruiter or hiring manager to understand your background in distributed systems, governance or compliance domain experience, and general interest in the role. Expect discussion around your most complex systems work and technical decision-making process.
2
Technical System Design Interview — Deep-dive discussion with an engineering leader on designing a large-scale distributed system with governance requirements. You'll be asked to architect solutions to complex problems similar to those in the role, discuss tradeoffs, failure modes, and how you'd verify correctness.
3
Code Review and Implementation Exercise — Hands-on exercise reviewing or implementing governance system components. You may be asked to optimize existing code, design a data structure for tracking deletions, or implement a compliance verification algorithm. Focus on correctness, readability, and consideration of edge cases.
4
Cross-Functional Collaboration Discussion — Conversation with non-engineering stakeholders (Legal, Privacy, Security, or Product) to assess communication skill with non-technical partners. Discuss how you'd translate regulatory requirements into technical specifications and handle conflicting stakeholder needs.
5
Leadership and Impact Panel — Conversation with multiple senior engineers and leadership discussing your approach to technical leadership, mentorship, and driving large initiatives. Focus on examples of ambiguous problems you've clarified, teams you've leveled up, and initiatives you've delivered end-to-end.