Lead Kotlin Backend Engineer (Functional Programming)

TL;DR

Lead Kotlin Backend Engineer (Functional Programming): Guiding a modern JVM squad in building sustainable, reliable, and high-quality backend systems with an accent on technical direction, system understanding, and strategic thinking. Focus on shaping event-driven domain flows, improving service boundaries, and fostering engineering excellence and culture.

Location: Hybrid in Amsterdam, Netherlands (2 office days per month required)

Salary: €95,000–€115,000 + up to 8% yearend bonus

Company

Your mid-sized tech savvy employer operates a digital platform used across several European regions, fostering a Kotlin-first engineering organization focused on sustainable, reliable, and high-quality backend systems.

What you will do

• Determine squad fit and provide leadership based on experience (guiding mid-level, technical direction for senior).
• Lead by example, writing Kotlin services and shaping event-driven domain flows.
• Help engineers with architecture, reliability, and communication.
• Improve processes and extend engineering culture.
• Strengthen refinement sessions, define priorities with product, and foster team growth.
• Develop people, influence engineering culture, and drive platform improvements.

Requirements

• At least 5 years of experience in backend engineering.
• Experience designing and building distributed backend systems.
• Strong experience with Kotlin, Java, or Scala with a keen interest in Functional Programming.
• Experience with microservices and event-driven architectures.
• Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, and cloud-native environments.
• Strong communication skills and emotional intelligence, with experience leading and mentoring a team of software engineers.

Nice to have

• Experience with Arrow, Redis, Ktor, and/or Meilisearch.

Culture & Benefits

• Amazing work/life balance with extensive work from home possibilities.
• 25 vacation days and good pension.
• Training and education budget for courses, trainings, meetups, and seminars.
• Flexible working hours.
• The best hardware, including MacBook options.
• Warm, compact engineering community where leadership makes a difference.