Staff Software Engineer

Staff Software Engineer – SDA Platform Most engineers optimize for the service in front of them. Staff engineers optimize for the platform that must keep delivering across hundreds of services two years from now — and they know the difference between a library that's elegant on paper and one that holds up when every feature team in the company depends on it. We're in the middle of a significant architectural evolution at Alarm.com — decomposing a large monolith into well-bounded, separately deployable services — and the SDA Platform team is the team that makes that possible. We own the proxy API layer that exposes monolith functionality today, the shared libraries every SDA is built on, and the developer tooling that shapes how engineering teams across ADC build software. We need someone who has done platform work like this before: who understands how shared infrastructure accrues complexity, how to set standards that teams actually adopt, and how to bring engineers along without breaking what's already in production. This is a hands-on role. You'll write code, lead design sessions, and stay close to production. The difference is that your decisions ripple outward — they shape how the whole organization builds. WHAT'S IN IT FOR YOU? - Broad organizational impact: The SDA libraries and developer tooling your team owns are used by feature teams across ADC. Your architectural decisions ripple outward. - Architectural impact: You'll drive domain design decisions that influence how ADC's platform evolves — separating tightly-coupled monolith concerns into well-bounded, scalable services. - Collaborate with outstanding people: We have a strong focus on teamwork, and we work to create a collaborative and welcoming environment that enables our teams to excel. - Make an immediate impact: You can expect to be given real responsibility for bringing new technologies to the marketplace. You will be empowered to perform as soon as you join the team! - Work with the latest technologies: You'll gain exposure to a broad spectrum of IoT and SaaS technology. Our tech stack includes C# .NET, SQL Server, Kafka, K8s, Azure, Redis, Helm, Argo Rollouts, Grafana, and Backstage. - Be Empowered: We don't want to micro-manage you. We barely want to tell you what to do. We want you to own stuff and bring your experience to make those products best in class. - Community and Camaraderie: One of our core values is to 'Keep It Fun,' which to us means fostering a strong sense of community. Our culture is built on collaboration and connection, where we celebrate our successes and believe that a positive, engaging environment is key to doing our best work. - Alarm.com values working together and collaborating in person. Our employees work from the office 4 days a week. WHAT CAN YOU DO FOR ALARM.COM? - Technical Leadership: Contribute to the technical direction of the SDA Platform team, helping guide the proxy API suite and key SDAs (Customer Login, Profile, Weather) — ensuring these services are built to a high standard and are operationally excellent. - Platform Library Stewardship: Help maintain and evolve the shared SDA library suite (Alarm.Kafka, Alarm.AspNetCore.*, Alarm.BackgroundService, Alarm.Caching.Redis, Alarm.CronJobs, and more) that serves as the foundational infrastructure for all SDA development at ADC. - Domain Architecture: Drive architectural analysis and design for core platform domains. Help ADC untangle historically coupled concepts — Customer Accounts, Customer Logins, Profiles — into properly bounded, maintainable service boundaries. - Developer Experience: Improve and maintain the SDA developer experience through dotnet-templates, Backstage integration, Specmatic contract testing, and progressive delivery tooling with Helm and Argo Rollouts. - Cross-Team Influence: Participate in architecture reviews, provide technical guidance to other engineering teams building on SDA infrastructure, and advocate for platform best practices across the organization. - Observability & Operations: Ensure the operational health of platform services through Grafana dashboards, alert validation, load testing support, and a strong culture of operational readiness. - Mentorship: Actively mentor engineers on the team, leading synchronous code reviews, raising technical bar, and helping junior and mid-level engineers grow their skills in platform engineering, domain design, and distributed systems. - AI Enablement: Model effective use of AI tools across the team — identifying where they provide real leverage and helping the team build good instincts for when and how to apply them. - Bring your ideas! We want our Staff Engineers to shape platform direction, not just execute on specs. - Other duties as assigned. WHAT DO YOU NEED? - Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, a related field, or equivalent work experience - 8+ years of professional software engineering experience - Strong experience with C# and .NET Core; experience with distributed systems and microservices architecture - Demonstrated ability to lead technical work on a team — setting direction, unblocking others, and holding a high bar for quality - Experience designing and building shared platform libraries or internal developer tooling used by other engineering teams - Experience with event streaming platforms (e.g., Kafka) and background service patterns - Solid understanding of distributed systems concepts: caching (Redis), high availability, service decomposition - Strong architectural instincts — you can evaluate a design, identify coupling risks, and guide teams toward better domain boundaries - Experience with Kubernetes-based deployments and modern observability tooling (Grafana, OpenTelemetry, or equivalent) - Excellent communication skills — you can write clear design documents, run productive code reviews, and explain complex tradeoffs to both engineers and stakeholders We would love it if you also had: - Experience with contract testing (e.g., Specmatic, Pact) and progressive delivery patterns (e.g., Argo Rollouts, canary deployments) - Familiarity with internal developer portals (e.g., Backstage) and developer experience programs - Experience with legacy API modernization or monolith decomposition at scale - Experience with Helm chart development and Kubernetes-native infrastructure tooling Please note that sponsorship of new applicants for employment authorization, or any other immigration-related support, is not available for this position at this time. WHY WORK FOR ALARM.COM? Collaborate with outstanding people: We hire only the best. Our standards are high and our employees enjoy working alongside other high achievers. Make an immediate impact: New employees can expect to be given real responsibility for bringing new technologies to the marketplace. You are empowered to perform as soon as you join the Alarm.com team! Gain well rounded experience: Alarm.com offers a diverse and dynamic environment where you will get the chance to work directly with executives and develop expertise across multiple areas of the business. Community and Camaraderie: One of our core values is to 'Keep It Fun,' which to us means fostering a strong sense of community. Our culture is built on collaboration and connection, where we celebrate our successes and believe that a positive, engaging environment is key to doing our best work. Alarm.com values working together and collaborating in person. Our employees work from the office 4 days a week. COMPANY INFO Alarm.com is the leading platform for intelligently connected properties. Millions of homeowners and businesses rely on Alarm.com's technology to secure, monitor, and manage their environments from anywhere. Our comprehensive suite of solutions—including security, video surveillance, access control, active shooter detection, intelligent automation, energy management, and wellness—is delivered exclusively through a trusted network of thousands of professional service providers and commercial integrators across North America and worldwide. Alarm.com's common stock is traded on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol ALRM. Alarm.com delivers serious security for serious people. For more information, please visit www.alarm.com. COMPANY BENEFITS Our total rewards package is designed to support you holistically—in your health, your finances, and your life outside of work. The package includes medical plans with company subsidies, a Health Savings Account (HSA) with a company contribution, and a 401(k) with an employer match. We encourage a healthy work-life balance with paid vacation that increases with tenure, paid holidays, wellness time, and paid maternity and bonding leave. To complete the package, we also provide company-paid disability and life insurance, all within a collaborative and casual work environment. Alarm.com is an Equal Opportunity Employer In connection with your application, we collect information that identifies, reasonably relates to or describes you ("Personal Information"). The categories of Personal Information that we may collect include your name, government-issued identification number(s), email address, mailing address, other contact information, emergency contact information, employment history, educational history, criminal record, and demographic information. We collect and use those categories of Personal Information about you for human resources and other business management purposes, including identifying and evaluating you as a candidate for potential or future employment or future positions, recordkeeping in relation to recruiting and hiring, conducting criminal background checks as permitted by law, conducting analytics, and ensuring compliance with applicable legal requirements and Company policies. By submitting your application, you acknowledge that we may retain some of the personal data that you provide in your application for our internal operations such as managing our recruitment system and ensuring that we comply with labor laws and regulations even after we have made our employment decision. Notice To Third Party Agencies: Alarm.com understands the value of professional recruiting services. However, we are not accepting resumes from recruiters or employment agencies for this position. In the event we receive a resume or candidate referral for this position from a third-party recruiter or agency without a previously signed agreement, we reserve the right to pursue and hire those candidate(s) without any financial obligation to you. If you are interested in working with Alarm.com, please email your company information and standard agreement to RecruitingPartnerships@Alarm.com.