Job Description
Most engineers write code. You'll write the chapter that comes before everything else.
The Zendesk Data Platform isn't a feature, it's the infrastructure that every product, every insight, and every customer-facing report is built on top of. Without it, nothing works. As a Senior Software Engineer on this team, you're not contributing to the platform. You're shaping its foundation.
Why this role is different
A lot of senior engineering roles promise impact but deliver ticket queues. This one is different because the work that you design today becomes the constraint or the capability that every team at Zendesk inherits tomorrow.
You'll work at the intersection of software engineering and data infrastructure, in a small team where your technical judgment carries weight and your decisions have a long shelf life.
This is a role for an engineer who wants their fingerprints on something that lasts. Not a feature that ships and gets forgotten, the infrastructure that makes the next ten features possible.
If that's the kind of work that gets you out of bed, we'd like to hear from you.
What you'll own
- Compliance Tooling: Build and maintain the tooling that will help Zendesk meet and maintain its compliance standards within the data platform.
- The reliability of systems that can't afford to fail: you'll own performance and scalability on AWS, which means the platform your colleagues and customers depend on stays up and stays fast
- Next-generation reporting and analytics infrastructure: built for the 170,000+ businesses who rely on Zendesk to understand their customers
- The full development lifecycle: from technical design and pair programming through to code review, testing, and CI because quality here isn't a phase, it's a habit
- Real integration complexity: AWS (EMR, Kubernetes, S3, Athena, Glue), Snowflake, Docker tools that matter, used together at genuine scale
- Shared team ownership: when something breaks at 2am, you're the kind of engineer who already has a theory about why
What you bring
- 7+ years in software development or data engineering
- 2+ years building and operating scalable, production-grade systems
- Proficiency in Java, Python, or Golang
- Hands-on experience with Snowflake and dbt
- Strong grasp of containerisation — Docker and Kubernetes in production, not just in tutorials
The mindset that fits:
- You care about the long-term health of a codebase, not just shipping fast
- You know that asking for help is a strength, not a gap
- You contribute confidently in technical discussions and genuinely value other perspectives
- You're drawn to hard problems, not comfortable ones
How you'll work
Hybrid, based in Melbourne. The team has built an onsite rhythm around collaboration, pairing, and the kind of whiteboard conversations that don't happen over Slack.
Hybrid: In this role, our hybrid experience is designed at the team level to give you a rich onsite experience packed with connection, collaboration, learning, and celebration - while also giving you flexibility to work remotely for part of the week. This role must attend our local office for part of the week. The specific in-office schedule is to be determined by the hiring manager.
The intelligent heart of customer experience
Zendesk software was built to bring a sense of calm to the chaotic world of customer service. Today we power billions of conversations with brands you know and love.
Zendesk believes in offering our people a fulfilling and inclusive experience. Our hybrid way of working, enables us to purposefully come together in person, at one of our many Zendesk offices around the world, to connect, collaborate and learn whilst also giving our people the flexibility to work remotely for part of the week.
As part of our commitment to fairness and transparency, we inform all applicants that artificial intelligence (AI) or automated decision systems may be used to screen or evaluate applications for this position, in accordance with Company guidelines and applicable law.
Zendesk is an equal opportunity employer, and we’re proud of our ongoing efforts to foster global diversity, equity, & inclusion in the workplace. Individuals seeking employment and employees at Zendesk are considered without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, medical condition, ancestry, disability, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We are an AA/EEO/Veterans/Disabled employer. If you are based in the United States and would like more information about your EEO rights under the law, please click here.
Zendesk endeavors to make reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities and disabled veterans pursuant to applicable federal and state law. If you are an individual with a disability and require a reasonable accommodation to submit this application, complete any pre-employment testing, or otherwise participate in the employee selection process, please send an e-mail to peopleandplaces@zendesk.com with your specific accommodation request.