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Principal Backend Software Engineer

Atlassian

San Francisco, CAJob$174–274K/yrPosted 2w agoStill listed today

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At a glance

Compensation
$174–274K/yr
Location
San Francisco, CA
Work Authorization
Not specified

Olive lists jobs from US employers, including remote roles you can work from the United States.

Requirements

Credentials this posting asks for.

Bachelor's degree

Job overview

Atlassian is seeking a Principal Backend Software Engineer to improve engineering teams’ work through creative solutions. The role focuses on unblocking software development, shaping large projects, solving architecture challenges, and partnering across engineering teams. The engineer will lead reviews, address high-risk bugs, transfer language expertise, and mentor junior colleagues. Atlassians can choose to work in an office, from home, or a combination of the two.

Skills & qualifications

RequiredNice to have

Skills

Java (Programming Language)Python (Programming Language)KotlinGo (Programming Language)Scala (Programming Language)Software as a Service (SaaS)Platform as a Service (PaaS)Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)Amazon Web ServicesGoogle Cloud Platform (GCP)Microsoft AzureContinuous IntegrationContinuous DeliverySaaSPaaSIaaSPublic CloudTrade-Off EvaluationMentoringInfluencing Decision MakersCustomer Impact AssessmentDeveloper ExperienceDeveloper ProductivityNodeJSContinuous Deployment

Qualifications

10+ Years ExperienceBachelor's DegreeComputer Science Degree

Full job description

Overview

Working at Atlassian Atlassians can choose where they work – whether in an office, from home, or a combination of the two. That way, Atlassians have more control over supporting their family, personal goals, and other priorities. We can hire people in any country where we have a legal entity. Your future team We're looking for a Principal Backend Software Engineer to join our team, passionately focused on delivering creative improvements for our engineering teams.

Responsibilities

What you'll do

  • Regularly unblock challenges faced in the software development cycle, from technical design to launch

  • Create solutions that are used by other teams and products - Determine plans-of-attack on large projects

  • Routinely solve complex architecture challenges and apply architectural standards and start using them on new projects

  • Lead code reviews and documentation and take on complex bug fixes, especially on high-risk problems

  • Set the standard for meaningful code reviews - Partner across engineering teams to take on company-wide projects

  • Transfer your depth of knowledge from your current language to excel as a Software Engineer

  • Mentor more junior members of the team

Compensation

At Atlassian, we strive to design equitable, explainable, and competitive compensation programs. We follow consistent hiring practices and account for each candidate's skills, knowledge, and experience when setting base pay within the range. Please visit go.atlassian.com/payzones for more information on which locations are included in each of our geographic pay zones. However, please confirm the zone for your specific location with your recruiter. This role may also be eligible for benefits, bonuses, commissions, and equity.

Pay Ranges

In The United States, we have three geographic pay zones. For this role, our current base pay ranges for new hires in each zone are: Zone A: $209,700 - $273,775 Zone B: $188,730 - $246,398 Zone C: $174,051 - $227,233

Qualifications

Your background

  • 10+ years experience in multiple hands-on software/technology leadership roles, with end-to-end responsibility through the software development lifecycle

  • Bachelor's degree with a preference for Computer Science degree

  • Expertise with one or more prominent languages such as Java, Python, Kotlin, Go, or Scala is required.

  • Understanding of SaaS, PaaS, IaaS industry with hands-on experience with public cloud offerings (e.g., AWS, GCP, or Azure)

  • Knowledge to evaluate trade-offs between correctness, robustness, performance, space and time

  • Practice in mentoring other engineers and influencing decision makers throughout the organization

  • Consideration of customer impact when making technical decisions

If you've got these skills, even better:

  • Experience in Developer Experience or Developer Productivity - Proficiency in Java or NodeJS

  • Experience in at least one additional language

  • Experience in CI (Continuous Integration) and CD (Continuous Deployment)

Benefits & Perks Atlassian offers a wide range of perks and benefits designed to support you, your family and to help you engage with your local community. Our offerings include health and wellbeing resources, paid volunteer days, and so much more. To learn more, visit go.atlassian.com/perksandbenefits. About Atlassian At Atlassian, we're motivated by a common goal: to unleash the potential of every team. Our software products help teams all over the planet and our solutions are designed for all types of work. Team collaboration through our tools makes what may be impossible alone, possible together. We believe that the unique contributions of all Atlassians create our success. To ensure that our products and culture continue to incorporate everyone's perspectives and experience, we never discriminate based on race, religion, national origin, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age, or marital, veteran, or disability status. All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines. To provide you the best experience, we can support with accommodations or adjustments at any stage of the recruitment process. Simply inform our Recruitment team during your conversation with them. To learn more about our culture and hiring process, visit go.atlassian.com/crh. In line with local law, identity verification (which may include use of biometric data) is a condition of employment with Atlassian for employment fraud purposes.

How this job compares

Set against the 40,832 open Software Engineer jobs on Olive Jobs, counted November 5, 2026.

Pay
  • This posting$174–274K/yr
  • California median$165–246K/yr7,688 salary ranges
  • US median$135–218K/yr32,472 salary ranges

This range's midpoint, $224K, is 9% above the California median midpoint ($205K) — in the middle half of Software Engineer salary ranges in California.

Openings
Olive Jobs lists 9,560 open Software Engineer jobs in California and 40,832 across the US. 7% of them nationwide are listed as remote or flexible.
Hiring the most in California
Experience
This posting asks for at least 10 years of experience — more than three in four Software Engineer postings that state a minimum ask for (median 5 years, across 33,318 postings).
Education
This posting asks for a bachelor's degree; 14,022 of the 40,832 open Software Engineer jobs (34%) ask for a bachelor's degree or higher.

Counted across the open, public US postings on Olive Jobs on November 5, 2026. Pay medians are the middle values of the low ends and of the high ends of postings that list both ends of a range in the same cadence (a yearly salary or an hourly rate); a range's midpoint is halfway between its ends. Pay and experience figures resting on fewer than 20 postings are left out.

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