Staff Backend Product Software Engineer, Team Formation
Dropbox
PLEASE READ: Zones are based on your zip code. If you’re within 100 miles of a listed metro area (straight-line radius), you’re included in that Zone. For this role, we are hiring in Zones 2 and 3. Check your Zone here before applying.
Role Description
Dropbox, we believe in simplifying the way people work together. We provide a range of innovative cloud-based solutions to empower individuals and businesses to share, access, and collaborate on their files seamlessly. Staff Engineers are pivotal in shaping our mission of building a more enlightened way of working where everyone can unleash their creative potential without constraints.
This team will own project Optimize Activation and Engagement Flows for Team Users. Lead a multi-year plan to modernize onboarding and activation, clean up core Dropbox surfaces, and build intelligent, adaptive systems that boost team activation, invites, and long-term engagement across platforms. Opportunity for large impact on the business helping Teams users activate on the right features to drive down churn.
Our Engineering Career Framework is viewable by anyone outside the company and describes what’s expected for our engineers at each of our career levels. Check out our blog post on this topic and more here.
Responsibilities
- Lead and mentor a team of 12 engineers to deliver high-impact business and customer outcomes.
- Contribute hands-on coding (≈50%), primarily in the back-end stack, and write clear, high-quality technical specs.
- Shape technical direction and partner with Product Management as DRIs for critical company-wide objectives.
- Drive cross-organizational impact through strong collaboration with engineering teams and cross-functional partners.
- Champion Agile practices, including planning, estimation, and retrospectives.
- Foster a culture of innovation, clarity in ambiguity, operational excellence, and a strong bias for action.
- Demonstrate senior technical leadership and maintain high engineering standards in a virtual-first environment.
Many teams at Dropbox run Services with on-call rotations, which entails being available for calls during both core and non-core business hours. If a team has an on-call rotation, all engineers on the team are expected to participate in the rotation as part of their employment. Applicants are encouraged to ask for more details of the rotations to which the applicant is applying.
Requirements
- BS, MS, or PhD in Computer Science or a related technical field involving coding (e.g., physics or mathematics) or equivalent technical experience
- Minimum of 12 years of experience as a software engineer
- Must have worked in a consumer user-facing team (versus a platform team, a developer-facing API-based product, etc)
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience working on a consumer-facing product onboarding flow on web
Compensation
US Zone 1
This role is not available in Zone 1
The range(s) listed above is the expected annual salary/OTE (On-Target Earnings) for this role, subject to change.
Please note, OTE are for sales roles only.
Salary/OTE is just one component of Dropbox’s total rewards package. All regular employees are also eligible for the corporate bonus program or a sales incentive (target included in OTE) as well as stock in the form of Restricted Stock Units (RSUs).
Dropbox takes a number of factors into account when determining individual starting pay, including job and level they are hired into, location/metropolitan area, skillset, and peer compensation. We target most new hire offers between the minimum up to the middle of the range.
Dropbox uses the zip code of an employee’s remote work location to determine which metropolitan pay range we use. Current US Zone locations are as follows:
• US Zone 1: San Francisco metro, New York City metro, or Seattle metro
• US Zone 2: California (outside SF metro), Colorado, Connecticut (outside NYC metro), Delaware, Illinois (Chicago metro), Indiana (Chicago metro), Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan (Chicago metro), New Hampshire, New Jersey (outside NYC metro), New York (outside NYC metro), Oregon, Pennsylvania (D.C. metro), Pennsylvania (outside NYC or DC metro), Texas (Austin metro) Virginia (DC metro), Washington (outside Seattle metro), Washington DC metro, West Virginia (DC metro), Wisconsin (Chicago metro)
• US Zone 3: All other US locations
Company Description
Dropbox isn’t just a workplace—it’s a living lab for more enlightened ways of working. We're a global community of bold visionaries and resourceful doers who are shaping the future of Dropbox—and with it the future of work. Our Virtual First model combines the autonomy of a distributed workplace with the power of human connection, making space for both meaningful work and meaningful relationships. With our start-up mindset and enterprise-level opportunities, you can be who you are and grow into who you’re meant to be. Here, you can own your impact to make work more intuitive, joyful, and human—for you as a Dropboxer and for hundreds of millions of people worldwide. If you're ready to push boundaries—and yourself— Dropbox is ready for you.
Team Description
The Dropbox Engineering Team builds the technology that creates more enlightened ways of working for hundreds of millions of people. Every day, our platforms—including Dropbox Dash, Dropbox Sign, and our core sync engine—handle over a billion files for users worldwide, creating engineering challenges as great as the opportunity for impact. Our software engineering team uses a range of technologies to solve interesting problems, including Python, React, Node.js, JavaScript, MongoDB, PostgreSQL, and Android development. We think like a startup but build for an enterprise, exploring new possibilities that transform how people work. If you're excited about turning complex technical challenges into intuitive solutions at scale, join our Engineering team. Areas of work include Machine Learning Engineers, Infrastructure Engineer, Product SWE Frontend and Backend, Mobile Software Engineers (iOS and Android), Engineering Manager, Data Engineer, Software Development Engineer in Test, Security Engineering, Site Reliability Engineer, Technical Program Managers, Network Engineer, Datacenter Engineer, Technical Supply Chain Manager and more.
Benefits
Dropbox is committed to investing in the holistic health and wellbeing of all Dropboxers and their families. Our benefits and perks programs include, but are not limited to:
- Competitive medical, dental, and vision coverage
- 401(k) plan with a generous company match and immediate vesting
- Flexible PTO/Paid Time Off, paid holidays, Volunteer Time Off, and more, allowing you time to unplug, unwind, and refresh
- Income Protection Plans: Life and disability insurance
- Business Travel Protection: Travel medical and accident insurance
- Perks Allowance to be used on what matters most to you, whether that’s wellness, learning and development, food and groceries, and much more
- Parental benefits including: Parental Leave, Child and Adult Care, Day Care FSA, Fertility Benefits, Adoption and Surrogacy Support, and Lactation Support
- Access to over 10,000 global co-working spaces through Gable.to, making it easy to book flexible workspaces for collaboration or individual work
- Quarterly Cell phone and internet allowance
- Mental health and wellness benefits
- Disability and neurodivergence support benefits
Additional benefit details are available upon request.
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