Lead Engineer jobs in United States, Wisconsin, Madison

Key job responsibilities
The ideal candidate is energized by owning Software projects from requirements through to support. We value owners who can partner with customers to design and deliver on challenging problems. They must be detail oriented, have good verbal and written communication skills, strong organizational skills, are able to work independently and can maintain professionalism under pressure.

- 3+ years of non-internship professional software development experience
- 2+ years of non-internship design or architecture (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
- Experience programming with at least one software programming language
- Knowledge of professional software engineering & best practices for full software development life cycle, including coding standards, software architectures, code reviews, source control management, continuous deployments, testing, and operational excellence
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent

- 3+ years of full software development life cycle, including coding standards, code reviews, source control management, build processes, testing, and operations experience
- Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent
- Experience contributing to the architecture and design (architecture, design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and current systems

You will:
- Provide first-line IT support for photo studio staff, resolving hardware, software, and network issues.
- Troubleshoot and maintain photography equipment, workstations, and related technology infrastructure
- Lead and implement IT projects focused on improving network reliability, facility operations, and hardware deployments- Monitor and maintain network performance, ensuring minimal disruption to photo production- Deploy new hardware and lead upgrades for site-wide equipment (laptops, networking, AV)
Key job responsibilities- Oversee network builds and improvements to ensure no down-time during operations hours
A day in the life
About the team
You will be part of a small team of IT engineers focused on site reliability, but tightly aligned with sister teams of Systems Engineers and Software Developers who build the tools deployed at our site. You will have the chance to be the voice of your customer and influence what they build.

- 1+ years of Windows Server technologies: AD, DFS, Print Services, SCCM experience
- 2+ years of troubleshooting in a multi-user high availability environment experience
- 2+ years of PC repair, troubleshooting, deployment and liquidation experience
- 1+ years of IT client, server, and network service delivery experience
- 2+ years of networking (such as DNS, DHCP, SSL, OSI Model, and TCP/IP) experience
- 2+ years of corporate setting Windows, Mac or Linux Operating systems support experience
- 2+ years of supporting and maintaining a corporate network environment experience
- High school or equivalent diploma

- 2+ years of computer networking experience
- Experience supporting video conference and teleconference equipment

A key focus of this role will be defining and implementing significant improvements to our Product Listing Pages (PLP) and Product Detail Pages (PDP) for both Zappos and our sister company Shopbop. You'll architect next-generation search and discovery experiences that enhance relevancy, filtering capabilities, and the overall customer journey. You will also contribute to Zappos systems across the new product lifecycle, from buying products, capturing product details, and generating best-in-class product imagery through innovative technical solutions. This includes developing innovative solutions for faceted navigation, personalized product recommendations, and unified catalog data models that serve both brands while maintaining their unique identities. You'll leverage technologies including LLM and ML tooling to push the boundaries of what's possible in e-commerce product discovery while ensuring consistent performance at scale.
Key job responsibilities
• Design and develop scalable, high-performance Java-based applications utilizing AWS services (ECS, SQS, S3, DynamoDB)
• Lead technical initiatives to improve the accuracy and efficiency of our catalog systems
• Architect and implement next-generation search and discovery experiences for Product Listing Pages (PLP) across Zappos and Shopbop
• Design and build enhanced Product Detail Page (PDP) systems that optimize for conversion, customer engagement, and cross-selling opportunities
• Develop innovative solutions to improve search relevancy, faceted navigation, and personalized product recommendations
• Create unified catalog data models that serve both Zappos and Shopbop while maintaining brand-specific customer experiences
• Push technical horizons by implementing technologies including LLM and ML tooling for improved product discovery
• Partner with product managers, UX designers, and business stakeholders to translate ambiguous requirements into elegant technical solutions
• Mentor junior developers by providing meaningful feedback and raising the bar on coding standards
• Drive architecture and technology choices that enable elegant, practical, and maintainable code
• Work backwards from customer problems to design and implement solutions optimized for speed and scalability
• Create technical documentation and decision records to build alignment with senior management and engineering teams
• Dive deep with engineering teams to refine requirements and unblock technical challenges
A day in the life
Your morning starts with code reviews and identifying a performance bottleneck in a search feature. You lead a technical design review for an ML-based product categorization system to improve search relevancy across Zappos and Shopbop. After analyzing A/B test results from a recent PDP enhancement, you work on integrating LLM capabilities for better product descriptions. Later, you collaborate with UX designers on a faceted navigation system for PLPs and document your approach for a unified catalog data model that preserves each brand's unique customer experience.

- 3+ years of non-internship professional software development experience
- 2+ years of non-internship design or architecture (design patterns, reliability and scaling) of new and existing systems experience
- Experience programming with at least one modern language such as Java, C++, or C# including object-oriented design
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent

- 5+ years of programming using a modern programming language such as Java, C++, or C#, including object-oriented design experience
- Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent
- Expertise in Java development with modern frameworks and AWS technologies (DynamoDB, ECS, SQS, SNS, S3), plus experience with both relational and non-relational databases