Software Engineer II (For Independent Contractors)

Details

A Software Engineer II owns the execution of technical elements in the Booking.com technology stack, products, and processes. The role is responsible for implementing technical solutions based on business requirements, estimating effort and impact, and delivering high-quality software. The engineer works with colleagues in other roles to design, prioritize, and implement technical tasks, ranging from product features to infrastructure automation, frameworks, tooling, and services.

Responsibilities

Building Software Applications

• Build software applications using relevant development languages and knowledge of systems, services, and tools appropriate for the business area.
• Write readable and reusable code using standard patterns and libraries.
• Refactor and simplify code by introducing design patterns when necessary.
• Ensure application quality by applying standard testing techniques and methods that adhere to the test strategy.
• Maintain data security, integrity, and quality by following company standards and best practices.

End-to-End System Ownership

• Own services end to end by monitoring application health and performance, setting and monitoring relevant metrics, and acting when they are violated.
• Reduce business continuity risks and bus factor by applying state-of-the-art practices and tools and writing documentation such as runbooks and OpDocs.
• Reduce risk and obtain customer feedback through continuous delivery and experimentation frameworks.
• Independently manage applications or services through deployment and production operations.

Technical Incident Management

• Address and resolve live production issues while mitigating customer impact within SLA.
• Improve system reliability through long-term solutions and root cause analysis.
• Track incidents by contributing to postmortem processes and logging live issues.

Architectural Guidance and Software Systems Design

• Advise product teams on technical solutions that meet functional, nonfunctional, and architectural requirements.
• Challenge application design rationale and provide context within the wider architectural landscape.
• Set direction for technical capabilities by evaluating target architecture improvements and aligning architectural decisions.
• Evaluate architecture solutions based on cost, business requirements, technology requirements, and emerging technologies.
• Describe the implications of changing existing systems or adding new systems.
• Apply engineering techniques such as prototyping, spiking, and vendor evaluation to support business growth and accelerate software development.
• Design adaptable solutions that meet current and future business requirements.

Critical Thinking and Continuous Improvement

• Identify patterns and underlying issues in complex situations and find solutions using logical and analytical thinking.
• Review and objectively evaluate ideas, plans, and solutions while initiating SMART improvements.
• Identify opportunities for process, system, and structural improvements, including performance gains.
• Design and implement improved process flows, standards, and practices.

Communication

• Deliver clear, well-structured, and meaningful information tailored to the target audience.
• Achieve mutually agreeable solutions through adaptability, clear communication, and active listening.
• Ask relevant follow-up questions to properly engage with others and understand their input.

Requirements

• Experience building software applications and writing readable, reusable code.
• Knowledge of software testing techniques and test automation.
• Knowledge of service monitoring, application health, performance metrics, deployment, and production operations.
• Understanding of incident management, root cause analysis, SLAs, and postmortem processes.
• Ability to evaluate and design software architectures and technical solutions.
• Strong logical, analytical, and communication skills.
• Experience with Java.
• Experience with AWS.

Contract Details

• Independent contractor position.
• 40 hours per week.
• One-year timeline: October 5, 2026, to October 4, 2027.