Backend Lead - Node.js/TypeScript

Backend LeadAbout the Role : We are looking for an experienced Backend Lead to take ownership of core server-side systems powering a modern, scalable digital platform.The role involves leading backend architecture, designing highly reliable APIs and services, improving system performance, and establishing strong engineering standards. You will serve as a technical anchor for the backend team while remaining hands-on with critical system design and engineering decisions.You will work closely with Frontend, Mobile, and DevOps teams to build backend systems that are scalable, secure, observable, and resilient under real-world production loads.Key Responsibilities : System Design & Backend Architecture : - Design and evolve APIs, data models, caching strategies, and message-driven architectures.- Own the performance, scalability, and reliability of backend systems.- Define and monitor service-level objectives (SLOs) and proactively address system degradation.- Make key architectural decisions around databases, query optimisation, indexing, caching, and data partitioning.- Design and maintain reliable payment integrations with appropriate security, idempotency, and reconciliation mechanisms.- Build backend systems capable of handling high-volume production workloads.Engineering Quality & Standards : - Establish and maintain backend coding, testing, and engineering standards.- Drive unit, integration, and contract testing practices across backend services.- Lead backend code reviews and provide actionable technical feedback.- Improve observability through effective logging, monitoring, alerting, and tracing.- Lead backend-specific incident reviews and postmortems, ensuring root causes are addressed through sustainable engineering solutions.Technical Leadership & Mentoring : - Mentor and technically guide junior and mid-level backend engineers.- Help engineers improve their system design, debugging, and production engineering capabilities.- Participate in technical hiring, including defining evaluation standards, conducting technical interviews, and providing structured feedback.- Collaborate with DevOps teams on infrastructure sizing, deployment reliability, and cloud-cost optimisation.- Work cross-functionally with engineering teams to ensure consistent architecture and technical standards.Must-Have Skills & Experience : - 6 - 10 years of backend engineering experience, with demonstrated ownership of complex and scalable systems.- Strong hands-on expertise in Node.js and TypeScript.- Strong understanding of both relational and non-relational databases, including appropriate use cases and optimisation techniques.- Practical experience with Redis or similar caching technologies.- Experience with message brokers such as Kafka, RabbitMQ, AWS SQS, or equivalent.- Hands-on experience integrating payment gateways, including understanding of idempotency, transaction reliability, security, and reconciliation.- Experience with Stripe or similar payment platforms is preferred.- Strong experience building and maintaining production-scale RESTful and/or GraphQL APIs.- Strong hands-on experience with AWS, particularly services such as Lambda, DynamoDB, RDS, ElastiCache, SES/SNS, and API Gateway.- Familiarity with event-driven architecture and programming.- Experience with observability and monitoring tools such as Datadog, Splunk, CloudWatch, and Grafana.- Strong understanding of backend performance optimisation, reliability, and production debugging.Nice-to-Have : - Experience building booking, availability, inventory, or transaction-heavy systems.- Experience working with high-concurrency or high-throughput backend systems.- Experience designing distributed systems and event-driven architectures.- Experience working in a product-focused engineering environment.What Success Looks Like : - Core APIs consistently meet defined p95/p99 latency SLOs, including during peak loads.- Backend test coverage and observability improve significantly within the first six months.- Payment integrations operate reliably with zero reconciliation errors over a rolling quarter.- Junior and mid-level engineers demonstrate measurable improvement in system design and production engineering capabilities.- Backend incidents lead to systemic improvements rather than temporary fixes.Key Performance Indicators : - API Latency - p95 / p99- API Error Rates- Database Throughput & Performance- Backend Reliability- Production Incident Count- Test Coverage & Observability- Payment Reconciliation AccuracyInterview Process : 1. Introductory & Background Discussion2. System Design Interview - Booking, availability, and payment architecture3. Performance Tuning Case Study - Diagnose and optimise a slow query or API4. Code Review Exercise - Review a backend PR and provide structured technical feedback5. Culture & Team Fit Discussion - Interaction with senior technology leadership (ref:hirist.tech)