This is a hybrid position which requires 8 days/month in the office. You can be based in our office in Washington DC. Existing work authorization is required at the time of application submission as WRI is unable to sponsor any visa work sponsorship for this position. To be eligible for this position in US, you must be a resident of DC, Maryland or Virginia at the start of employment.

About the Program:

WRI’s Forest Program works with governments, businesses, and civil society to sustain forests for future generations. We aim to curb deforestation worldwide and help restore and reforest already-cleared land. With these goals in mind, the Global Forest Watch (GFW) initiative makes the best available data for monitoring forests accessible online. By harnessing cutting-edge technology, GFW allows anyone to access near real-time information about where and how forests are changing around the world. 

Recognizing that the agricultural industry is essential for human well-being yet is often associated with tropical deforestation, GFW Commodities and Finance focuses on developing applied monitoring solutions for commodity supply chains. With the recent launch of GFW Pro and upcoming launch of GFW Pro Premium, companies, financial institutions and other entities can now securely monitor and manage deforestation risk in areas they buy from or invest in. 

Job Highlight:

Reporting to GFW Pro Engineering Lead, you will integrate equity into your work. 

You will participate in all aspects of technology development and technology operational support for GFW Pro. You will work with our engineering lead to define technical solutions, mentor other engineers, and foster development and cloud infrastructure best practices to improve our product and team workflows over time. You will also work with the rest of the team to develop innovative new features that solve critical sustainability problems for our customers.

You will be supporting the Engineering Lead on a team that is responsible for all aspects of software development for GFW Pro including developing high quality, reliable, secure, highly available and scalable web-based applications. The GFW Pro team prides itself on a collaborative, independent culture. You are experienced in collaborative leadership, an excellent communicator, self-directed and self-motivated, and comfortable with changing circumstances. Mission alignment, and desire to work directly with influential supply chain actors to reduce deforestation is important.  We’re looking for passionate, driven people to tackle the most pressing challenges of our lifetime – join us

What will you do:

Technical Leadership (30%):-

• Mentor peer engineers, reviewing code and acting as an escalation point to advise and support troubleshooting for more complex architecture decisions or bugs
• Collaborate with product managers, external technical partners, and other team members during the product strategy and early feature definition process by advising on technical solutions that balance architecture design best practices with development level of effort and user needs
• Work with engineering lead to define infrastructure and development workflow improvements that enable our team to collaborate even more effectively and efficiently over time, while producing resilient code and minimizing regressions
• Become a subject matter expert in our external API. Collaborate with our engineering lead, product managers, and general management to shape our API roadmap. Participate in technical customer support and develop a deep understanding API-related customer needs to inform future feature development and improvements. Assist with technical documentation

Product Development (60%):

• Participate in the design and development of the GFW Pro product vision, strategy, and prioritization considering institutional priorities, user needs, and budget in coordination with GFW Pro Product and Engagement teams
• Participate in the prioritization of platform improvements and plan releases in coordination with GFW Pro Product Team and vendors as needed to optimize user experience, and address user needs and technical debt, while considering additional dependencies
• Collaboratively design client-side and server-side architecture for long-term agility, maintainability, security, and reliability
• Develop, test, release new features, and improve existing functionality of the GFW Pro platform and responsive web application
• Write automated tests and technical documentation
• Troubleshoot, diagnose, and fix software issues across the stack
• Understand the customer through automation of the collection of user feedback, analytics and industry trends and translate into improved and new product features
• Work with the cross cutting WRI product organization (Product, Engagement, Research, and Data teams) to improve GFW Pro and other WRI software
• Participate in developing appropriate cross product technology standards and guidelines

Technology Operations Support (10%):

• Support the GFW Pro operational support by improving the onboarding experience and understanding trends in support requests
• Respond to, diagnose, and fix bugs, ensuring issues are not repeated, and coordinate with the GFW product team, GIS Team and external vendors
• Maintain and improve an automated system for collecting and reporting on key product metrics

What will you need:

• Education: You have a completed a bachelor’s degree in computer science or a related field. Relevant work experience in lieu of degree is accepted
• Experience: You have a minimum of 5 years of relevant experience with backend stack: NodeJS (Typescript), Express, Jest, and Python
• Experience with frontend stack: React/Redux, HTML/CSS, Jest, and Cypress
• Experience with databases: SQL server and SQLite, as well TypeORM
• Experience with cloud services like AWS (ECS, Lamba, Step functions, API Gateway, EMR, SQS, S3, etc..) with Terraform
• Experience in building maintainable and reliable frontend and backend software in agile environments
• Experience coaching and/or mentoring other engineers
• Experience with continuous integration and deployment
• Excellent verbal and written communication and interpersonal skills
• Self-motivated learner with a willingness and ability to take on new challenges
• Collaborative, detail-oriented, and ability to prioritize quickly amidst changing circumstances
• Interest in working for a mission-driven environmental organization
• Ability to work primarily during US eastern standard time zone hours
• Experience and desire to work with geospatial data systems and large-scale data analysis. Experience working across a matrixed team
• Experience and desire to work with geospatial data systems and large-scale data analysis. Experience working across a matrixed team
• Passionate about the work they are doing
• Leadership experience, ability to lead and support other engineers
• Languages: English proficiency. Fluency in Spanish, Portuguese or Bahasa is a plus
• Requirements: Existing work authorization is required where this position is based. WRI is unable to authorize visa work authorization

Potential Salary: US salary range is between 101,000 and 114,000 USD. Salary is commensurate with experience and other compensable factors.

How to Apply: Please submit a resume with a required cover letter by the date of 10 December 2024. We may close for applications sooner if we receive a high volume of qualified applications.

We are unable to consider your application without a cover letter that describes your experience with product management, user research and/or managing vendors, in addition to your resume.

You must apply through the WRI Careers portal to be considered.

What we offer:

• Access to the WRI global network with the opportunity to exchange with and learn from passionate colleagues working at the cutting edge of their fields across Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the US
• The chance to have an impact and to develop your career within a mission driven organization with access to varied learning and training opportunities. 
• A workplace that strives to put diversity and inclusion at the heart of our work
• The opportunity to join and get involved in different working groups and affinity groups to shape the future of WRI
• Commitment to hybrid working model with flexible working hours
• Generous leave days that increase with tenure
• Medical Coverage, Dental Coverage, Vision Coverage, retirement plan access and employer contribution

About Us:

Founded in 1982, World Resources Institute (WRI) is an independent, nonprofit global research organization that turns big ideas into action at the nexus of environment, economic opportunity, and human well-being. We are working to address seven critical challenges that the world must overcome this decade to secure a sustainable future for people and the planet: climate change, energy, food, forests, water, sustainable cities, and the ocean. WRI has a global staff of over 1,800 people with work spanning 60 countries. We have offices in Africa, Brazil, China, Europe, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Colombia and the United States, as well as a growing presence in other countries and regions.

The foundation of our work is delivering high-quality research, data, maps, and analysis to solve the world’s greatest environment and international development challenges and improve people’s lives. We work with leaders in government, business, and civil society to drive ambitious action and create change on the ground. Equally important, we bring together partners to develop breakthrough ideas and scale-up solutions for far-reaching, enduring impact.

Our mission and values:

WRI’s mission is to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations.

Our values are shared ideals that bind us together: Integrity, Innovation, Urgency, Independence and Respect.

Our culture:

WRI is committed to advancing gender and social equity for human well-being in our mission and applies this principle to our organizational and programmatic practices. We are committed to providing equal opportunities in employment; we embrace all diversity and encourage women, the LGBTQ+ community, persons with disabilities, Afro-descendants, and Indigenous people to apply. Recognizing our strong commitment to gender equality, WRI has also been awarded EDGE certification.

Our team in Human Resources carefully reviews all applications.