Staff Software Engineer - IAM, Cloud Platform

IonQ•Bothell, WA

1d•Hybrid

About The Position

IonQ is developing the world's most powerful full-stack quantum computer based on trapped-ion technology. We are pushing past the limits of classical physics and current supercomputing technology to unlock a new era of computing. Quantum computing has the potential to impact every area of human society for the better. IonQ’s computers will soon redefine industries like medicine, materials science, finance, artificial intelligence, machine learning, cryptography, and more. IonQ is at the forefront of this technological revolution. We don’t just build the world’s best quantum computers—we sell them! We make our systems available via the cloud for customers all over the world, customers who have complex organizations and customer bases of their own in many cases. We are looking for a Staff Software Engineer to lead developing our Identity and Access Management (IAM) and Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) systems, enabling our customers to federate their own identities and protect their organizations’ data. You’ll lead key components of the platform in collaboration with our product team and other engineers, to build the best quantum platform for our customers and partners.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering or a related field, or equivalent training, fellowship, or work experience
8+ years of professional software engineering experience, with a history of technical leadership and shipping large-scale, mission-critical systems
Deep, expert-level knowledge (4+ years) on designing, building, and operating IAM and RBAC systems in production environments at scale
Past experience implementing SAML 2.0 in production
Proven experience designing and leading large-scale, cross-team technical projects from inception to completion, especially track record of leading cross-team initiatives related to identity, access control, or security platforms
Solid understanding of microservices architecture, event-driven systems, and data consistency patterns.
Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, demonstrated through a portfolio of technical design documents, architectural diagrams, or public presentations
Expertise programming backends in Go or JavaScript
A strong sense of ownership and the ability to navigate ambiguity to drive complex projects forward with a high degree of autonomy
A practice of using AI in day to day coding

Nice To Haves

10+ years software developer experience
5+ years experience writing microservices in a kubernetes environment
Past experience with GCP
Experience evolving or migrating legacy authentication/authorization systems to modern, scalable architectures
Deep familiarity with enterprise security requirements, including least privilege, auditability, and compliance constraints
Experience operating IAM systems that support high availability, low latency, and strict reliability SLOs
Active participation in the broader tech community (e.g., open-source contributions, conference talks)
Regular use of fully agent-based augmented coding

Responsibilities

Own the technical vision and architecture for IAM and RBAC systems across the entire platform for multiple products. Design, evolve, and standardize scalable authorization models (RBAC, ABAC, policy-based access) that support complex enterprise use cases
Drive cross-team initiatives that impact authentication, authorization, and identity lifecycle management.
Make high-impact architectural decisions around: Role modeling and permission hierarchies
Identity propagation and service-to-service authorization
Act as the final technical authority on IAM/RBAC design reviews and critical security decisions.
Ensure IAM and RBAC systems meet high availability, performance, and reliability requirements
Establish operational standards for: Role changes and permission rollout
Emergency access and break-glass procedures
Monitoring and alerting for auth-related failures or abuse