Staff Java Developer (Spring Boot/Azure)- Remote Portugal

Job Description

ABOUT THE OPPORTUNITY

Join a leading retail technology company as a Staff Java Developer and take technical leadership in building robust, scalable backend solutions that power modern retail operations worldwide. You'll work for a technology-driven retail organization building a fantastic engineering team where experienced developers thrive.

As a Staff-level engineer, you'll take ownership of technical aspects of development, lead complex initiatives across teams, mentor junior developers, and contribute to the entire software development lifecycle using Java, Spring Boot, Azure Cloud, Kubernetes, Kafka, and GraphQL Federation. This role positions you as a technical leader who shapes engineering practices, influences architectural decisions, and drives excellence across the organization while working with talented individuals solving complex technical problems.

This staff/lead-level position requires minimum 10+ years of software development experience with strong focus on Java backend development, MANDATORY experience leading complex initiatives, collaborating with teams on technical designs, coaching and mentoring junior engineers, and influencing engineering practices. B2 English essential.

PROJECT & CONTEXT

You'll build mission-critical retail technology systems enabling seamless customer experiences, transaction processing, and inventory management across the retail ecosystem. As a Staff Java Developer, you'll take technical ownership across the full software development lifecycle, designing and implementing backend solutions using modern Java, Spring Boot microservices, and cloud-native architectures on Azure platform.

Technical leadership is fundamental - you'll lead complex initiatives spanning multiple teams, collaborate with engineering teams on technical designs and architectural approaches, drive consensus on technical decisions, and own end-to-end delivery of sophisticated features. Mentorship and coaching define your impact beyond code - you'll coach junior engineers through pair programming and code reviews, influence engineering practices within your team and across the organization, establish standards that elevate engineering quality, and shape the engineering culture.

You'll design backend solutions using Java (modern versions) and Spring Boot ecosystem frameworks including Spring Data, Spring Security, Spring Cloud, building enterprise-grade microservices. On Azure Cloud, you'll leverage services including Azure App Service, Azure Functions, Azure SQL Database, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Service Bus. Kubernetes orchestration is essential for deploying containerized applications using Docker, with Apache Kafka powering event-driven architectures for real-time data streaming. GraphQL Federation enables unified API layers across distributed services.

You'll use Terraform for infrastructure as code, GitHub for collaborative development and CI/CD pipelines, implement comprehensive testing including TDD practices, and apply OOP principles, SOLID principles, and design patterns in your architectural decisions. Working in Agile environments, you'll participate in sprint ceremonies and drive continuous improvement.

Core Tech Stack: Java (modern versions), Spring Boot, Azure Cloud, Kubernetes, Kafka, GraphQL Federation, Terraform, GitHub

Domain: Retail technology, e-commerce operations, transaction processing

Leadership: Technical initiative leadership, cross-team collaboration, mentorship, engineering practice improvement

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR (Required)

Software Development Experience: MANDATORY - Minimum 10+ years in software development with strong focus on Java backend development and proven track record delivering production systems at scale

Complex Initiative Leadership: MANDATORY - Experience leading complex technical initiatives spanning multiple teams and driving strategic projects to completion

Technical Design Collaboration: MANDATORY - Critical experience collaborating with other teams to agree on technical designs and building consensus on architectural approaches

Coaching & Mentoring: MANDATORY - Proven experience coaching and mentoring junior engineers through code reviews, pair programming, and technical guidance

Engineering Practice Influence: MANDATORY - Demonstrated ability influencing and improving engineering practices, establishing standards, and elevating team capabilities

Modern Java Expertise: MANDATORY - Deep proficiency in Java with strong focus on backend development - experience with newer Java versions (Java 11+, Java 17+, Java 21+) is a significant plus

Spring Boot Framework: MANDATORY - Production experience with Spring Boot for building microservices, RESTful APIs, and enterprise applications

Object-Oriented Programming: Solid knowledge of OOP principles including SOLID principles, design patterns (Gang of Four), and clean code practices

Azure Cloud Platform: MANDATORY - Production experience with Microsoft Azure Cloud including core services, cloud architecture patterns, security, and deployment strategies

Kubernetes Orchestration: MANDATORY - Hands-on experience with Kubernetes for deploying and managing containerized applications

Apache Kafka: MANDATORY - Production experience with Apache Kafka for event streaming, pub-sub messaging patterns, and event-driven architecture

GraphQL Federation: MANDATORY - Experience with GraphQL Federation for building federated API gateways and schema composition

Terraform Infrastructure: MANDATORY - Hands-on experience using Terraform for infrastructure-as-code and provisioning cloud resources

Git & GitHub: MANDATORY - Proficiency in Git version control and GitHub for source code management and code review workflows

Testing Expertise: Strong experience with unit testing frameworks (JUnit, Mockito), integration testing, and test-driven development (TDD) practices

CI/CD Practices: Proficiency in continuous integration and continuous deployment including automated testing and build automation

Agile Methodologies: Experience working in Agile development environments including Scrum ceremonies and iterative delivery

Problem-Solving Skills: Strong analytical and problem-solving abilities for debugging complex distributed systems

Communication Excellence: Excellent communication and teamwork skills for collaborating across stakeholders and building consensus

Design Patterns: Deep understanding of software design patterns and their practical application

English Proficiency: B2 level (Upper Intermediate) or higher for technical communication and leadership

Work Authorization: Must be located in Portugal

NICE TO HAVE (Preferred)

Additional Spring Frameworks: Spring Cloud, Spring Data JPA, Spring Security, Spring Batch

Reactive Programming: Spring WebFlux, Project Reactor, or RxJava for building non-blocking applications

Microservices Patterns: Service discovery, circuit breakers, API gateways, distributed tracing, resilience patterns

Docker Expertise: Advanced Docker skills including image optimization, multi-stage builds, container security

Azure Advanced Services: Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Service Bus, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Redis Cache, Azure Key Vault, Azure Monitor

Event Sourcing & CQRS: Knowledge of event sourcing and CQRS patterns for building scalable distributed systems

Domain-Driven Design: Understanding of DDD principles, bounded contexts, aggregates, and tactical patterns

Performance Engineering: Application performance profiling, optimization, memory management, garbage collection tuning

Distributed Systems: Deep understanding of consistency models, consensus algorithms, CAP theorem

Additional Cloud Platforms: Experience with AWS or GCP demonstrating cloud versatility

Service Mesh: Istio or Linkerd for microservices communication management

API Design Excellence: RESTful API design, API versioning strategies, OpenAPI/Swagger documentation

Database Technologies: SQL databases (PostgreSQL, Azure SQL) and NoSQL databases (MongoDB, Cosmos DB, Redis)

Message Queue Systems: RabbitMQ, Azure Service Bus, AWS SQS beyond Kafka

gRPC: Knowledge of gRPC for high-performance service-to-service communication and Protocol Buffers

GraphQL Advanced: Deep GraphQL expertise including subscriptions, batching, caching strategies, DataLoader pattern

Monitoring & Observability: Prometheus, Grafana, Application Insights, ELK Stack, or distributed tracing platforms

Security Best Practices: OWASP Top 10, secure coding practices, authentication/authorization patterns

Retail Domain Knowledge: Experience in retail technology, e-commerce platforms, inventory management, point-of-sale systems

Payment Systems: Payment processing, payment gateways, PCI compliance, or financial transaction systems

High-Availability Systems: Designing and operating high-availability systems with SLA requirements

DevOps Practices: Infrastructure automation, monitoring, incident response, site reliability engineering

Elasticsearch: Experience with Elasticsearch for search, indexing, and analytics capabilities

Architectural Leadership: Track record of architectural leadership and defining technical roadmaps

Technical Writing: Strong technical documentation skills for architectural decisions and design documents

Open Source Contributions: Active contributions to open source projects or maintainer experience with Java ecosystem libraries

Conference Speaking: Experience speaking at technical conferences or meetups

Scala or Kotlin: Knowledge of JVM languages beyond Java