Senior Software Engineer

Appian Corporation · McLean, Virginia

  • Senior
  • Full-time
  • $125,000 – $250,000
  • Posted 2026-10-23
  • Confirmed live on 1 November 2026

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Job description

Here at Appian, our values of Intensity and Excellence define who we are. We set high standards and live up to them, ensuring that everything we do is done with care and quality. We approach every challenge with ambition and commitment, holding ourselves and each other accountable to achieve the best results. When you join Appian, you’ll be part of a passionate team dedicated to accomplishing hard things, together.

Senior Software Engineer

McLean,VA | Work Model: On-site

Architect and construct high-performance, resilient platform features that power mission-critical enterprise operations at unprecedented scale.

ABOUT THE TEAM

As a Senior Software Engineer on the Appian platform team, you will ensure our AI-Powered Process Automation platform remains fast, scalable, and capable of handling whatever complex workflows our global customers configure. Your team owns the full technical spectrum from the high-performance data layer through the cross-platform user interface to the design tools that enable rapid application creation. You will solve problems of scale and flexibility that most engineers never encounter, building enterprise-grade solutions that serve customers in ways you never imagined.

THE OPPORTUNITY

Appian is transforming how the world's largest organizations automate their most critical business processes, and our platform must evolve to meet exponentially growing demands for speed, scale, and intelligence. This role puts you at the heart of that evolution, where your architectural decisions and code directly impact Fortune 500 companies running their mission-critical operations on our platform. You will tackle technical challenges that push the boundaries of distributed systems, performance optimization, and enterprise resilience.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Architect and construct high-performance, resilient platform features, robust APIs, and shared frameworks to power mission-critical operations.

• Leverage advanced knowledge of data structures and algorithms to optimize platform performance, reducing latency and improving throughput for mission-critical customer workflows

• Design and implement robust REST APIs that power integrations across complex enterprise ecosystems, ensuring reliability and performance under high-volume production loads

• Execute technical spikes to clear architectural runways, ensuring system stability, modularity, and seamless long-term scalability.

• Partner with product and engineering teams to translate customer requirements into elegant technical solutions that balance flexibility with performance

• Execute comprehensive code reviews and establish engineering best practices that elevate code quality and system reliability across the platform

• Lead technical investigations into performance bottlenecks and scalability challenges, implementing solutions that future-proof the platform for exponential growth

• Elevate engineering standards by leading rigorous code reviews, driving proactive, refactoring, and optimizing low-latency performance.

• Provide technical leadership and mentorship to junior and mid-level engineers, fostering engineering excellence and operational accountability.fostering engineering excellence and operational accountability.

• Hands-on experience leveraging AI tools to enhance productivity and efficiency.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelors degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related technical field

• 6+ years of professional software development experience building enterprise-scale applications

• Expert-level proficiency in Java programming and object-oriented design principles

• Deep understanding of data structures, algorithms, and their practical application in solving complex performance challenges

• Proven experience designing and implementing REST APIs for enterprise integrations

• Strong foundation in software design patterns and architectural principles for scalable systems

• Experience in CI/CD in Cloud environments, like AWS and continuous integration systems, like Jenkins

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience with AWS cloud services and distributed cloud-native architectures

• Background in building high-throughput, low-latency systems serving large user bases

• Familiarity with relational and NoSQL database optimization techniques

The base salary range represents a good faith and reasonable estimate of the range at the time of posting. Actual compensation will be dependent on a number of factors including, but not limited to, the candidate’s relevant work experience, qualifications, internal peer equity, and market and business conditions that exist when extending an offer. A discretionary bonus may be awarded in recognition of individual and company performance.

In addition, Appian provides generous benefits offerings that include a 401(k) plan with company match, flexible time off, paid parental leave, medical, dental, and vision plans, life insurance, disability insurance, well

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