Senior Software Engineer (Python) - Contractor

About the role

About Very (Remote - Colombia) Very is a fully distributed technology firm led by expert problem-solvers who create efficient, scalable solutions that move commercial, industrial, and consumer products from pilot to production in record time. We believe that real innovation happens in the grind - working shoulder to shoulder with clients who are building the future. Our team thrives on that energy. When we're not helping clients deliver business-critical outcomes, we're refining our craft and celebrating what it means to do hard things well. We've built a collaborative, tight-knit culture that thrives in both remote and in-person settings. We've won numerous workplace awards over the years, including Great Place to Work certification and recognition from Parity.org as a Best Company for Women to Advance. Our clients include well-known brands like Vizio, Peloton, Clear, iHeart Radio, and Fellowes - all determined to leverage connected devices and AI to drive meaningful impact. Our job is simple: help them win. About This Role As a Senior Software Engineer, you'll play a key role in building and maintaining secure, scalable applications that support critical customer and business needs. You'll work across the stack - from designing backend services to implementing front-end features while collaborating closely with cross-functional teams. This role is hands-on: you'll translate requirements into well-designed solutions, write production-ready code, participate in code reviews, and contribute to the overall reliability and performance of our systems. You'll also help support our applications in production through on-call rotations and proactive issue resolution. This position is ideal for an engineer who enjoys solving real-world problems, working in modern cloud environments, and contributing to systems end-to-end. You'll have the opportunity to deepen your technical expertise, influence design decisions, and grow within a supportive engineering culture. At Very the key distinction between mid, senior and lead roles is the scope and depth of your expertise and responsibility. As a mid you can own and deliver tasks (work packages) with a high level of professionalism and know when to reach out for help. As a senior, you have deep expertise in your area of specialization and can execute independently in your domain while interfacing with other software stacks. As a lead you become a true full stack engineer with the ability to plan, execute and lead a team across the full software stack, while interfacing with non-software aspects of the project. This is not an easy role. You'll work in complex domains, under real deadlines, and with clients who expect you to bring clarity, confidence, and results. If you find satisfaction in doing hard things well - in solving tough problems, building real systems, and helping others rise to the challenge - you'll fit right in. As a client services organization, travel may be required up to 10% of the time. What You'll Be Working On Every engagement at Very is different, but they share one common theme: we build things that matter. From connected hardware and data systems to large-scale web and AI-driven platforms, you'll: Capture technical requirements and contribute to high-level and low-level design for software solutions using AWS and Azure technologies. Write production-grade Python, and SQL code that meets high standards for maintainability, security, and observability. Build and support complex, microservice-based, event-driven systems. Implement testing strategies and automation across the stack. Participate in on-call rotation and help maintain system health, performance, and reliability. Collaborate across engineering, design, and product to deliver high-quality outcomes. Identify and proactively address potential technical or operational risks before they impact customers. You'll operate in a modern, polyglot environment that includes: Frontend: React, Vite, Expo, TypeScript, WebSockets, Progressive Web Apps Backend: Python, FastAPI, Django, Node.js Cloud: AWS (Lambda, ECS, Fargate, RDS, CloudFront, CloudWatch, SNS, SQS), Azure DevOps: Docker, Terraform, Pulimi, GitHub Actions, CI/CD pipelines Databases: Postgres, Redis, TimescaleDB, DynamoDB Testing: Jest, Cypress, Pytest, and other automated test frameworks Outcomes Deliver High-Quality Features: Ship secure, reliable code that meets requirements, adheres to standards, and delivers measurable business value. Strengthen System Reliability: Improve observability, performance, and operational excellence across services and components. Support Cross-Functional Delivery: Collaborate effectively with lead engineers, designers, PMs, and client stakeholders. Raise the Bar: Contribute to better patterns, tooling, and engineering standards across teams. Enhance Customer Success: Proactively identify and resolve technical issues that could impact system behavior or user experience. Responsibilities Implement features across