Senior Software Engineer, Web API Platform

Senior Software Engineer, Web API Platform

Apply for the Senior Software Engineer, Web API Platform role at Scribd, Inc.

At Scribd Inc. (pronounced “scribbed”), our mission is to spark human curiosity. We create a world of stories and knowledge, democratize the exchange of ideas and information, and empower collective expertise through our four products:
Everand, Scribd, Slideshare, and Fable.

We support a culture where employees can be real, bold, and collaborative. Our flexible work benefit, Scribd Flex, gives employees—and their managers—choice over daily work style while keeping intentional in‑person moments essential for collaboration and culture. Occasional in‑person attendance is required for all Scribd Inc. employees, regardless of location.

We hire for “GRIT”:
Goals, Results, Innovative ideas, and Team collaboration. This means showcasing the ability to set and achieve goals, deliver results, contribute innovative ideas, and positively influence the broader team.

The Web Platform team is part of the Developer Platform organization and supports our broader Web Modernization efforts across the company. Our mission is to help product teams move faster by providing a scalable, well‑designed API foundation for modern web architectures. We reduce coupling, improve developer experience, and establish durable integration patterns between frontend experiences and backend systems.

We are hiring a Senior Software Engineer, Web API Platform to build and own a company‑wide API platform that accelerates web modernization  will design, build, and own new product‑facing web APIs that span the full web product surface across Scribd and Everand, acting as the primary interface between modern web applications and existing backend systems.

We anticipate fragmented data access patterns and lack of standardized APIs. This role focuses on designing APIs with clear contracts, predictable performance, and strong observability, improving developer experience and enabling teams to ship faster and safer.

In this role, you will work closely with frontend and backend teams to define integration patterns, guide API usage, and ensure the platform scales with real‑world data volumes and access patterns.

• Strong ownership mindset, from initial design through production, iteration, and long‑term maintenance.
• Pragmatic system design, balancing ideal architecture with real‑world constraints.
• Designing performance‑aware APIs with intentional constraints that scale safely.
• Strong collaboration with frontend & backend teams for performance and integration improvements.
• Long‑term perspective on maintainability, extensibility, and developer experience.

• 6+ years of professional software engineering experience, with a strong backend or platform focus.
• Proven experience designing APIs for high‑volume or data‑intensive product workflows.
• Experience implementing and integrating APIs with a Ruby on Rails application.
• Familiarity with modern API paradigms (REST, Graph
  
  QL, gRPC) and their performance and operational tradeoffs.
• Experience with query patterns, caching, pagination, and common performance pitfalls.
• Experience designing APIs with explicit contracts, versioning, and testing strategies.
• Experience working with modern web frontends (React, Next.js, or similar).
• Strong communication skills and experience championing API design across teams.
• Hands‑on experience incorporating AI‑assisted tools into development workflows (debugging, testing, documentation, or design exploration).

• Designed APIs where performance was explicit and intentional.
• Considered observability, failure modes, and system health from the outset.
• Placing thoughtful constraints on API consumers to protect scalability and developer experience.
• Treating APIs and developer tooling as products, not just infrastructure.
• Deep concern about how backend and API decisions impact end users.
• Enjoying greenfield work while navigating integration with existing systems.
• Providing informed opinions and refining them through discussion and iteration.

Base pay is determined within the range…