The Role

We're looking to add a Software Engineer to our small but mighty tech team,currently consisting of our CTO, a Data Analyst,a Designer, and a team of part-time and volunteer contributors. You'll work shoulder-to-shoulder with our CTO to build and maintain the platforms that power our food rescue operations, and you'll have real ownership over the code you ship.

We're looking for an early-to-mid career engineer (1-4 years of professional experience) who brings the diligence of a skilled craftsperson to their work - someone who writes code they'd be proud for the next person to read, documents as they go, and treats quality assurance as part of the job. Think less "move fast and break things," more "build it right and explain why."

At SE, we know AI tooling has massively shifted the software engineering workflow - and we're leaning in. We're looking for a candidate who brings strong engineering principles and judgement to an AI assisted workflow, knowing when to move fast with agentic assistance, and how to build responsible guardrails for sustainable and maintainable software.

For more information on our work, read more at docs.sharingexcess.com and surplus.sharingexcess.com.

What You'll Do
Frontend Development (Primary Focus)

• Build and maintain features for Surplus, our large-scale operational web application
• Develop and improve public-facing marketing sites
• Implement end-to-end testing to ensure reliability across user flows
• Bring clean, consistent UI to life using TypeScript, React, and Tailwind

Backend Development

• Build and maintain RESTful APIs using TypeScript,Hono and ORPC
• Write and optimize SQL queries and relational schemas with PostgreSQL and Drizzle
• Implement testing, CI/CD pipelines, and data integrity safeguards

Code Quality & Collaboration

• Write well-documented code with the next reviewer in mind - clear PRs, descriptive comments, and thorough commit messages
• Participate in code review and contribute to a culture of craft on a small, high-trust team
• Flag blockers early and give honest status updates - we value transparency over projecting confidence
• Assist in managing cloud infrastructure via Railway, Docker, and Sentry

What We're Looking For
Required

• 1-4 years of professional software engineering experience with meaningful exposure to a production codebase
• Proficiency in TypeScript and React
• Working knowledge of RESTful API design
• Ability to write and reason about SQL queries and relational data schemas
• Fluency with Git-based workflows: branching, pull requests, code review
• Strong written communication - able to document decisions, describe PRs clearly, and explain technical tradeoffs to non-technical teammates

Nice to Have

• Experience with lower level tools in our stack: TanStack Query, Hono, Drizzle, PostgreSQL, Redis, Docker
• Familiarity with E2Eintegration testing frameworks (Playwright, Vitest, etc.)
• Exposure to deploying applications in cloud-based architectures (we happen to use Railway as our primary host)
• Experience on a small or early-stage engineering team
• Prior work in operational, logistics, or mission-driven software

Tools & Tech

Languages & Frameworks: TypeScript, React, Hono, Drizzle

Data & Infrastructure: PostgreSQL, Redis, Docker, Railway

Observability & QA: Sentry, Playwright/Vitest, CI/CD pipelines

Dev Workflow: Git/GitHub, AI-assisted tooling (Claude, Cursor,)

Styling: Tailwind CSS
Compensation & Logistics

• Salary: $80,000 - $110,000, commensurate with experience
• Full benefits package (health, dental, vision, and more)
• Location: Philadelphia area required; hybrid schedule with approximately one day per week in office
• Reports to: CTO (no direct reports)
• Travel: None required

Our Hiring Process

We want to give every candidate a fair shot to show us their thinking. Here's what to expect:

• Initial application + resume
• Brief take-home skills assessment
• Paired programming exercise with our CTO for top candidates
• Cultural interview with the broader team