Senior Backend Engineer - Identity & Access Management

ABOUT onX We’re a team of builders, adventurers, and risk takers using technology to help people confidently explore the outdoors. Driven by our mission to awaken the adventurer inside everyone, we build products that optimize every outdoor experience and inspire confidence to get out and go further. We’re a high-growth tech company. The pace is fast, the work takes grit, and ambiguity is part of the job. As the world changes around us, we adapt - continuously evolving how we build, prioritize, and deliver. Our business moves quickly, and there’s real opportunity to shape what we build next. Each of our verticals - Hunt, Offroad, Backcountry, and Fish - is at a different stage of maturity, which means the challenges you encounter and the impact you have will vary depending on where you sit and what the business needs most. We operate with an experimentation mindset, continually iterating and improving how we solve problems. We expect our people to use the latest tooling, including AI, thoughtfully and responsibly, pairing human judgment with technology to increase quality, speed, and impact. Our impact comes to life through the products we build, in the stories of our customers, and in our growing commitment to land stewardship and recreational access. WHAT YOU WILL DO onX is seeking a Senior Backend Engineer with a passion for building scalable platform Identity and Access Management (IAM) systems. Your focus will be on designing, developing, and scaling secure authentication, authorization, and user management services that are foundational to our platform. You will play a key role in evolving our IAM platform and delivering seamless cross-platform authentication across iOS, Android, and web. You will be part of our Core Services team that enables product teams to build faster and more securely by providing core infrastructure, services, and patterns. This is a great opportunity to help shape the future of how users securely access and interact with onX's suite of outdoor technology products. This position reports to the Director of Engineering, Core Services. TECHNOLOGIES WE USE Our backend engineers primarily work in Go running in Kubernetes on Google Cloud Platform. The IAM team works extensively with identity platforms (Ory Kratos, Hydra, Oathkeeper), distributed databases (CockroachDB), and OAuth 2.0/session management patterns. Understanding mobile authentication tradeoffs (WebView vs. browser-based auth, token-based patterns) is particularly relevant for this role. As an onX Senior Backend Engineer, your day to day responsibilities would look like: (Essential Job Duties) Build scalable, secure IAM services that enable new features and products across the onX suite of apps Design and implement backend systems focusing on observability, fault-tolerance, security, and high performance Drive architectural decisions related to Identity and Access Management, ensuring alignment with and advancing our broader platform strategy Define and implement SLIs/SLOs for IAM services; drive reliability engineering practices including incident response and performance optimization Write thorough unit, integration, and acceptance tests to ensure high service quality and maintainability Document APIs, service architectures, and technical decisions for internal stakeholders and external partners as needed Collaborate closely with fellow engineers, product managers, and other stakeholders through design reviews, paired programming, and cross-functional planning sessions Leverage and extend existing onX services and platform patterns to drive consistency and reduce duplication Proactively improve system monitoring, alerting, diagnostics, and operational readiness of IAM-related services Participate in an on-call rotation to ensure backend services remain highly available and reliable Mentor and share knowledge with engineers on your team Lead by example and embody onX's company values, fostering a culture of technical excellence, ownership, and collaboration LOCATION onX has created a thriving distributed workforce community across several US locations. This position can be performed from an onX corporate office, “Basecamp,” or “Connection Hub".  Corporate Offices : onX was founded in Montana with offices in Missoula and Bozeman. If you prefer to work in an office at least part of the time this is a great option. Basecamps : Basecamps are established virtual workforce communities where a sizable number of distributed team members group for work, volunteering, socializing, and adventure.   Our current Basecamps are located within a 90-mile radius of the following: Austin, TX; Charlotte, NC; Denver, CO; Kalispell, MT; Minneapolis, MN; Portland, OR; Salt Lake City, UT; and Seattle, WA.  Connection Hubs : Connection Hub locations are smaller, emerging communities of distributed team members.  Our current Connection Hubs are located within a 60-mile radius of the following: Boise, ID; Charleston, SC; Dallas/Fort Worth, TX; Phoenix, AZ; Richmond, VA; Spokane, WA; and Vermont. WHAT YOU’LL BRING B.S., M.S., or equivalent experience in computer science or a related field Eight or more years of professional software development experience, with API development as a primary focus for at least three of those years Strong Go/Golang backend development experience with RESTful API design Experience building and debugging distributed, scalable, highly available microservices architecture Solid understanding of identity systems: OAuth 2.0, session management, bearer token authentication, SSO integrations Experience with distributed databases (CockroachDB or similar PostgreSQL-compatible distributed systems) and relational databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL) Excellence in designing and developing modern APIs and scalable systems that ensure reliability and extensibility Familiarity with Docker, Kubernetes, and infrastructure-as-code techn