Staff Data Engineer

Details

Airbnb was born in 2007 when two Hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to over 4 million Hosts who have welcomed more than 1 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, Hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with communities in a more authentic way.

The Community You Will Join:

At Airbnb, we need to ensure every area of the business has trustworthy data to fuel insight and innovation. Understanding the business need, securing the right data sources, designing usable data models, and building robust & dependable data pipelines are essential skills to meet this goal.

We are currently hiring for the following teams:

Communication and Connectivity:

This team builds systems and tools for stays, experiences, and beyond that support first class rich communications and connections among all members of the Airbnb community. We create scalable and intelligent communication tools, including messaging and notifications. The data team utilizes industry-leading tools, builds scalable data systems and applies AI models to provide insights and support all products in CnC.

Users, Listings, and Marketplace Data and AI:

This team is a group of passionate machine learning, data, and analytics engineers responsible for creating new data products for our Guests and Hosts, Sales, and Finance. You’ll be part of the overall Guest and Host organization that is responsible for the Airbnb web and native apps used by hundreds of millions of our guests and Hosts.

BizTech:

This team is responsible for building scalable, high quality data sets and solutions for Finance, Airbnb’s Investor community, E-team and the rest of the Airbnb Data Community. You will have an opportunity to interact with cross functional stakeholders to collaborate and build solutions. You will join a world class data engineering team with a design first attitude, focus on building quality, scalable and testable code with rigor on data engineering practices. We are looking for strong engineers whom we can teach business context within a short amount of time.

The Difference You Will Make:

• You will partner with a cross-functional team, including product managers, frontend/backend engineers, data scientists, and machine learning engineers, to influence and build company-wide product releases.
• You will develop innovative data systems to empower partners in making critical business decisions, enable product engineers to create scalable online systems with optimized user experiences, and collaborate with machine learning engineers to build AI/ML systems.
• Additionally, you will work with our global sales team to develop business tools that optimize their workflow, making a significant impact on Airbnb's revenue.

A Typical Day:

• Architect and productionize batch and real-time data systems to support various products and business needs.
• Ensure the quality, performance, and stability of data systems through robust quality systems and monitoring practices.
• Design and optimize data models for efficient storage and retrieval to meet critical product and business requirements.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including product managers, engineers, data scientists, and business partners, to align on data requirements and develop scalable systems.
• Tune, productionize, and optimize data systems and machine learning models to enhance their effectiveness and efficiency.
• Build and maintain strong relationships with partner engineering teams, including backend, client, data science, and ML teams, to ensure seamless integration and support.
• Contribute to the development of long-term data strategies and roadmaps, and influence the technical direction of data engineering practices within the organization.
• Mentor and coach team members, providing guidance and support to enhance their skills and performance.

Your Expertise:

• 9+ years of relevant industry experience with a Bachelor’s and/or Master’s degree in CS/EE, or equivalent experience, or 6+ years of experience with a PhD.
• Extensive experience designing, building, and operating robust distributed data platforms (e.g., Spark, Kafka, Flink, HBase) and handling data at the petabyte scale.
• Strong knowledge of Java, Scala, or Python, and expertise with data processing technologies and query authoring (SQL).
• Proven ability to design, productionize, and optimize batch and real-time data pipelines and systems, ensuring their quality, performance, and stability.
• Excellent ability to collaborate with cross-functional teams, including product managers, engineers, data scientists, and business partners, to align on requirements and drive data-driven decision-making.
• Advanced analytical and problem-solving skills with a focus on data quality, governance, and system reliability.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, capable of influencing stakeholders and conveying complex technical concepts effectively.
• Expertise in data modeling, warehousing, and working with relational (e.g., PostgreSQL, MySQL) and columnar databases (e.g., Redshift, BigQuery).
• Experience working with machine learning engineers to integrate ML models into data systems and products (preferred but optional).
• Ability to provide technical leadership and mentorship, guiding teams on best practices and contributing to the development of data engineering strategies.
• Flexibility and innovative thinking to evaluate and incorporate new technologies and methodologies to improve data processes and solutions.

Your Location:

This position is US - Remote Eligible. The role may include occasional work at an Airbnb office or attendance at offsites, as agreed to with your manager. While the position is Remote Eligible, you must live in a state where Airbnb, Inc. has a registered entity.