Staff Developer

At Apono, we empower organizations to securely operate in the cloud by aligning operations and security around access management. Our platform enables Just-In-Time and Just-Enough access across complex cloud environments, helping engineering teams move faster while reducing risk.

Now part of 1Password, we're building the next generation of secure access for people, systems, and AI agents.

At Apono, we are on a mission to bridge the operational security gap in access management, simplifying businesses' journey to the cloud through a commitment to innovation and excellence. Our team is made of passionate professionals who thrive on collaboration to solve complex problems, guided by our founders & leadership group with decades of proven expertise.

We are seeking a Staff Developer to join our team and take a lead role in shaping the architecture, evolution, and reliability of our systems core services.

You will directly shape Apono's technical direction, keeping our architecture aligned with company strategy while pushing forward what's possible in access management and engineering excellence. This role means owning a roadmap that raises the bar on quality, scalability, and security across our platform, as we bridge the operational security gap for organizations running in the cloud.

What You Can Expect

• Shape the architecture and long-term technical direction of core services powering Apono's platform.

• Own complex, ambiguous initiatives end-to-end, from problem definition through rollout, spanning one or more teams and systems.

• Break down large, undefined problems into a coherent execution plan, and drive that plan to completion.

• Partner with product, design, and other engineering teams as a technical authority, translating ambiguity into clear architectural decisions.

• Balance rapid iteration with long-term system health, scalability, and security.

• Raise the bar for engineering standards, code quality, observability, and operational excellence across the org.

• Mentor senior and mid-level engineers through design reviews, technical deep-dives, and pairing.

• Evaluate new technologies and propose architectural improvements that shape how Apono builds going forward.

• Leverage AI-assisted engineering workflows to multiply your own impact and the team's.

• See your technical decisions directly shape the platform's ability to scale with the business.

Requirements

• 8+ years of experience as a backend software developer, with a track record of owning large-scale production systems.

• Proven experience architecting and evolving distributed systems, not just building within them.

• Deep experience with cloud-native architectures (microservices, Docker, Kubernetes) at scale.

• Strong systems thinking - able to reason about trade-offs across performance, reliability, and security.

• Demonstrated ability to lead complex, cross-team technical initiatives from ambiguity to delivery.

• A track record of raising technical standards beyond your immediate team.

• Ability to balance deep technical ownership with business and product outcomes.

Nice to have

• Hands-on experience in identity and access management.

• DevOps or platform engineering technical leadership background.

• In-depth experience with cloud service providers, mainly AWS.

• Strong security mindset.

• Experience mentoring engineers into senior or staff-level roles.