Staff Software Engineer

About Proofpoint

Proofpoint is a worldwide leader specializing in human- and agent-centered cybersecurity solutions. Our technology safeguards the way people, data, and AI agents connect across email, cloud platforms, and collaboration tools. Trusted by over 80 of the Fortune 100 companies along with 10,000 large corporations and millions of smaller entities, we are committed to stopping cyber threats, preventing data loss, and strengthening resilience in people and AI-managed workflows. Our mission is to secure the digital environment while enabling individuals to work safely and confidently.

Our Work Philosophy

At Proofpoint, you will join a global team that challenges conventions to transform cybersecurity, driven by our BRAVE core values:

• Bold: Innovating dream ideas fearlessly.
• Responsive: Quickly adapting to feedback and challenges.
• Accountable: Delivering top-quality results.
• Visionary: Thinking ahead to solve emerging problems.
• Exceptional: Achieving impactful execution.

Role Overview

Nuclei seeks a Senior or Staff Software Engineer to steer the advancement of our Capture and Intelligence platform within Proofpoint. This role involves developing in a Python-first monorepo that powers communication capture, compliance systems, event processing, AI-based classification, investigative agent workflows, and evolving decision-governance solutions. The ideal candidate excels in handling complex production systems, including external API integrations, OAuth procedures, rate limiting, asynchronous job orchestration, Postgres data modeling, specialized customer requirements, LLM-driven intelligence, and enterprise-level reliability. Beyond strong coding skills, this role demands technical ownership and the ability to clarify intricate systems while uplifting team excellence.

Key Responsibilities

• Design, construct, and sustain essential backend components encompassing capture services, shared platform data models, event pipelines, asynchronous workers, APIs, and AI-driven intelligence workflows.
• Lead the technical implementation of ambiguous, high-impact initiatives that span diverse services or domains.
• Directly engage with systems ingesting and normalizing communications data from platforms such as Microsoft, Slack, Zoom, Google, Bloomberg, Salesforce, and internal Proofpoint Archives, among others.
• Contribute to AI-native product elements including large language model classification, agent executions, investigator workflow enhancements, telemetry systems, evaluations, and future decision-tracing features.
• Enhance system reliability, observability, test coverage, and operational maturity within a rapidly evolving production codebase.
• Troubleshoot challenging customer and production issues related to data integrity, API behaviors, asynchronous failures, scalability, performance, and compliance-sensitive procedures.
• Mentor engineering team members via design and code reviews, paired programming, technical documentation, and architectural guidance.

Technical Environment

• Python 3.12, Pydantic for data validation, psycopg/Postgres for data access, SQL, asynchronous job management systems, AWS infrastructure including SQS and Lambda-like orchestration, and Docker-based local emulation.
• Shared platform models governing accounts, feeds, events, jobs, schedules, agents, investigations, decisions, archives, and various integrations.
• Capture service architectures focused on API client development, authentication flows, data normalization, synchronization orchestration, retry mechanisms, and data backfills.
• AI implementations using structured outputs from large language models, evaluation frameworks, token budgeting, embeddings and vector search, virtual LLM/local model usage, and agent workflow management.
• Front-end UI components built with React and TypeScript for settings management, agent run monitoring, investigation tracking, decision-making, and operational workflow controls.

Required Qualifications

• At least 8 years of professional experience developing production backend or full-stack systems with significant technical ownership over complex or ambiguous areas.
• Strong proficiency in Python including static typing, data modeling, thorough testing, and production debugging capabilities.
• Extensive experience with relational database systems, especially Postgres, including schema design, performance-tuning queries, managing migrations, and ensuring data accuracy.
• Demonstrated expertise in building distributed and asynchronous architectures involving message queues, worker processes, retry logic, idempotency, rate limiting, and resilient failure recovery strategies.
• Proven skill integrating with APIs, preferably including working knowledge of OAuth, webhooks, pagination, throttling, vendor-specific edge cases, and managing long-running backfills.

Why Join Proofpoint?

• Competitive salary packages reflecting your expertise.
• Inclusive and comprehensive benefits.
• Opportunities to shape your career growth aligned with your goals.
• Flexible working arrangements tailored to employees’ needs.
• Annual wellness programs and community outreach initiatives.
• Continuous recognition programs celebrating your contributions.
• Global collaboration and networking opportunities across teams and geographies.

Our Culture

We foster a culture grounded in values that create a sense of belonging, empower meaningful work, and drive daily success for everyone. We encourage applicants from diverse backgrounds, experiences, and viewpoints. Accommodation requests during recruitment or interviews are welcome by contacting accessibility support.