Lead Backend Engineer

Lead Backend Engineer – Notification Hub (Onsite) 
Location: Onsite (Springfield, MO / Dallas, TX) 
Role Type: C2C or W2 

Note: Need only very senior resource who has stronger Coding skills. Preferred work location- Springfield, MO

Role Summary (JD Should match 100%)
Our Client is modernizing its customer messaging ecosystem through a centralized Notification Hub built on Google Cloud Platform (Google Cloud Platform). The Lead Backend Engineer will drive the architecture and development of this platform, overseeing GKE-based microservices, Pub/Sub event workflows, Avro schema governance, secure webhook processing, vendor integrations, and preference synchronization. This role sets the technical direction and ensures platform scalability, resilience, and extensibility. 

Key Responsibilities 

·         Lead design and development of Notification Hub services: Notification Router, Webhook Receiver, Preference Sync, and related components. 

·         Architect and maintain event-driven pipelines using Google Pub/Sub with concurrency, retry/DLQ, idempotency, and backpressure handling. 

·         Define and govern Avro schemas for all event types (order, cart, preference, profile). 

·         Develop and evolve the vendor-agnostic adapter layer for messaging providers (Listrak today; Iterable/Braze/etc. future). 

·         Oversee secure webhook ingestion through Apigee → GKE with HMAC validation and rate limiting. 

·         Enforce zero-trust security using IAM, Workload Identity, and least-privilege access. 

·         Drive platform-level observability: logs, metrics, distributed tracing, and event audits. 

·         Collaborate with Digital, Loyalty, CRM, MDM, Architecture, and Infrastructure teams. 

·         Provide technical leadership to offshore Senior Developers, Developers, and QA/Automation. 

·         Participate in architecture reviews, capacity planning (4M monthly events), and production operations. 

Required Skills & Experience 

·         10 years backend engineering; 5 years implementing event-driven architectures. 

·         Strong expertise in Java, Spring Boot, microservices, and distributed systems. 

·         Hands-on experience with GKE/Kubernetes, Pub/Sub or Kafka, and cloud-native design. 

·         Experience with Avro, Protobuf, or schema-based payload governance. 

·         Strong integration experience with external APIs (MarTech, CRM, MDM, or messaging systems). 

·         Understanding of IAM, secure webhook handling, and zero-trust principles. 

·         Experience implementing observability frameworks across microservices. 

Preferred Qualifications 

·         Experience building or operating large-scale notification, messaging, or orchestration platforms. 

·         Exposure to ESPs (Listrak, Braze, Iterable, SFMC, Adobe Campaign). 

·         Experience with hybrid on-prem → cloud event ingestion models.