Load & Stress Engineer (all genders)

JOIN OUR TEAM As a Senior Software Engineer on our Web & API team, you will play a key role in shaping and evolving our e-commerce storefront. Working across the full stack, from React components and data integrations to AI-powered features, you will take ownership of complex features end-to-end, from specification and architecture through to delivery and monitoring. In close collaboration with Product and Design in an agile environment, you will combine a keen eye for performance with a drive to build experiences that delight millions of customers. Your curiosity for emerging technologies will help the team work smarter, ship faster, and continuously push the boundaries of what is possible. This position is permanent and based in Munich. WHAT YOU'LL DO * Design, build, and maintain features end-to-end across the storefront and mobile API, from specification through server-side data loading and UI to production release and maintenance * Build and extend integrations with our e-commerce, headless CMS, search, analytics, and experimentation platforms * Build AI-powered user-facing features, directing and reviewing AI coding agents in your own and the team's workflow while owning the correctness, security, and maintainability of everything that ships * Own the caching, rendering, and performance strategy for the storefront and mobile API * Partner with Product Managers and Designers to turn business goals into performant, high-quality user experiences * Champion code quality and reliability through testing, code reviews, and the conventions and context that keep the codebase healthy for both engineers and AI agents as it grows YOU COME WITH * Deep expertise in React, TypeScript, and modern frontend development, backed by strong software architecture skills and solid engineering principles * A sharp focus on performance across the stack, from frontend rendering to backend data fetching, including server-side rendering (ideally with React Router) and GraphQL * Strong specification and architecture judgment, turning ambiguous requests into precise, testable specs that teammates and coding agents build against, while making load-bearing technical decisions with confidence * Rigorous approach to code verification, designing the tests, evals, and checks that determine production readiness without relying on surface-level outputs * High standards for maintainability, resilience, security, and cost efficiency, reasoning through failure modes and remaining especially vigilant when reviewing AI-generated code * Proven fluency with Agentic AI, directing coding agents on well-scoped work, reviewing output with informed scepticism, owning the result, and leveraging AI to accelerate delivery and power user-facing features * A product-driven mindset that connects technical decisions to business impact and user experience, with prior experience in Product Engineering or Product Management considered a plus * Fluency in English with excellent written and verbal communication skills WHY WESTWING If you are looking for a place where ambition meets creativity, where ideas turn into impact fast, and where people are trusted to grow - you have found it. At Westwing, we’re building the Superbrand in Design with a team that’s shaping the future of beautiful home & living. Here is what you can look forward to: • A high-performance culture built on trust, feedback and collaboration • An inspiring, international environment that empowers you to think big, take ownership, and grow beyond your comfort zone • A flexible hybrid setup with ideally 3 office days per week - because strong connections and quick collaboration make great ideas happen • Professionally equipped workstation of your personal choice • 30 days of paid holiday to rest, recharge, and come back ready to create • A beautiful, centrally located, dog-friendly office with inspiring spaces, a sunny terrace, and good food - designed for moments that energise and connect • Exclusive discounts - 40% off Westwing Collection, 20% off third-party brands (each on non-reduced items), 10% Family & Friends discount, plus special-occasion vouchers • Wellbeing support through mental health resources, sports memberships, and preventive care • Sustainable mobility options with discounted public transport and JobRad - moving with purpose and care for the planet • Support for working parents, including our on-site Westwing Wichtel daycare and a partnership with multilingual provider Elly & Stoffl • One annual Social Impact Day to give back to a cause you care about - because being human is our true superpower • Team rituals that celebrate results and togetherness - from Summer & Winter Parties to Oktoberfest ABOUT US Westwing, Europe’s #1 in Beautiful Living e-commerce, is present in 20+ European countries and achieved a GMV (Gross Merchandise Volume) of EUR 507 million in 2025. As Europe’s premium one-stop destination for Design Lovers, it offers a unique brand experience with a carefully curated assortment of the Westwing Collection and 3rd party design brands. The integrated platform combines Shop, Daily Specials, Stores, the B2B Service (Westwing Business) and the Westwing Design Service. Westwing’s team works together on its shared purpose to “Excite people to create homes that unlock the full beauty of life”. Founded in 2011, Westwing is headquartered in Munich and went public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in October 2018. Our team is a diverse group of professionals aiming for high performance, working together at a fast pace in an inspiring, international and informal environment that enables you to grow your career while working with a brand and products our customers love. We’re made up of passionate people who are creative enough to disrupt the status quo, brave enough to fail and smart enough to win. So come, be part of the “wow, you work at Westwing?” crowd. Diversity is deeply rooted in our culture. Our mission doesn’t stop to inspire only your design choices, it continues to embrace an inclusive lifestyle filled with respect to everyone’s uniqueness, cultural differences and equal opportunity. DEPARTMENT Technology

Aker Systems was founded in 2017 by a team of experienced technology professionals who recognised an opportunity to provide highly secure enterprise data platforms to large organisations.  We build and operate ground-breaking, ultra-secure, high performance, cloud-based data infrastructure for the enterprise. Our proprietary technology solutions drive performance and reduce costs while helping our clients to improve the management and sharing of data across their organisations. In 2024, Aker Systems won the Breakthrough Culture Awards highlighting growth companies putting culture first. In 2020 Aker Systems was recognised as a ‘One to Watch’ on the Sunday Times Tech Track.  The Company was also recognised at the Thames Valley Tech Awards 2020; winning the Thames Valley Tech Company of the year, the Emerging Tech Company and High Growth Tech Business categories.  We encourage people of all different backgrounds and identities to apply.  We are committed to maintaining an inclusive, and supportive place for you to do your very best work. About the Role We are seeking a Lead Performance Automation Engineer to define and drive performance engineering strategy, tooling, and practices across large-scale, distributed, cloud-native platforms. This is a technical leadership role responsible for ensuring systems are: * Scalable * Reliable * Resilient under load * Optimised for performance and cost efficiency You will lead performance testing and engineering initiatives across multiple teams, embedding non-functional quality into every stage of the software lifecycle. Key Responsibilities 1. Performance Engineering Strategy & Leadership * Define and own the organisation-wide performance testing and engineering strategy. * Establish standards for: * Performance testing approaches * Workload modelling * Capacity planning * Introduce and scale performance engineering practices across multiple delivery teams. * Provide technical leadership and mentoring to QA and engineering teams on performance best practices. * Align performance goals with business SLAs, SLOs, and user experience expectations. 2. Performance Test Architecture & Automation * Design and implement scalable performance test frameworks and automation pipelines. * Lead adoption of tools such as: * Gatling, JMeter, k6, Locust or similar * Build reusable solutions for: * Load testing * Stress testing * Spike testing * Soak testing * Integrate performance testing into CI/CD pipelines for continuous validation. * Ensure performance tests are repeatable, reliable, and production-representative. 3. Workload Modelling & Test Design * Define realistic user workload models based on production data and usage patterns. * Design performance test scenarios reflecting: * Peak load * Concurrent users * Throughput and latency requirements * Apply risk-based prioritisation for performance testing. * Ensure coverage across: * APIs * Microservices * Data pipelines * Event-driven systems 4. Backend, API & Distributed System Performance * Lead performance validation for: * Microservices architectures * Event-driven systems (Kafka) * High-throughput APIs * Analyse latency, throughput, error rates, and bottlenecks across distributed systems. * Validate system behaviour under failure conditions and degraded environments. * Ensure horizontal scalability and resilience strategies are tested. 5. Cloud, Infrastructure & Scalability Testing * Validate performance across: * AWS cloud environments * Containerised platforms (Docker, Kubernetes) * Conduct capacity planning and infrastructure benchmarking. * Ensure systems scale efficiently using: * Auto-scaling * Load balancing * Distributed architectures * Evaluate performance of Infrastructure as Code (Terraform) deployments. 6. Observability, Analysis & Bottleneck Resolution * Use observability tools to analyse system performance, including: * Metrics (Prometheus, Datadog) * Logs (ELK) * Traces (distributed tracing tools) * Identify and diagnose: * CPU, memory, I/O bottlenecks * Network latency issues * Database performance constraints * Collaborate with engineering teams to optimise system performance and architecture. 7. Non-Functional Quality Governance * Define and enforce performance SLAs, SLOs, and acceptance criteria. * Establish quality gates for performance within CI/CD pipelines. * Ensure performance requirements are validated before production release. * Drive adoption of performance testing standards across teams. * Support audit, compliance, and regulatory expectations in performance-critical systems. 8. Production Performance & Continuous Improvement * Analyse real production performance data to refine testing strategies. * Lead performance-related incident investigations and RCA activities. * Establish feedback loops between production observability and test environments. * Drive improvements in: * System responsiveness * Stability under load * Operational resilience 9. Metrics, Reporting & Optimisation * Define and track performance KPIs, including: * Response times * Throughput * Error rates * Resource utilisation * Build performance dashboards and reporting frameworks. * Drive continuous optimisation initiatives based on performance data. * Align performance metrics with business outcomes and user experience. Technology Environment Performance Testing Tools * Gatling, k6, JMeter, Locust (or similar) Languages * Java, Kotlin, Python, or JavaScript Architecture * Microservices, Event-driven systems, Kafka Cloud & Infrastructure * AWS, Kubernetes, Docker, Terraform CI/CD * GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins Observability * Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog, ELK, Distributed Tracing What We’re Looking For Essential * Proven experience as a Performance Test Lead / Performance Engineer / SDET * Strong experience defining performance testing strategies and frameworks * Hands-on expertise with modern performance testing tools * Deep understanding of: * Scalability and distributed system performance * Cloud-native architectures * Experience integrating performance testing into CI/CD pipelines * Strong skills in: * Performance analysis and bottleneck identification * Root cause analysis and system optimisation * Experience defining and tracking performance SLAs/SLOs and KPIs * Ability to lead and influence cross-team quality improvements Desirable * Experience in high-scale or regulated environments * Exposure to: * Chaos engineering * Resilience and fault injection testing * Experience with capacity planning and cost optimisation * Knowledge of security-performance interactions (e.g., encryption overhead) Personal Attributes * Strong systems thinking and analytical mindset * Ability to translate performance data into practical engineering improvements * Influential leader across engineering and product teams * Proactive and outcome-driven * Strong communication and stakeholder management skills Aker Systems Attributes At Aker we work as a team; we are collaborative, hardworking, open, and delivery obsessed. There is no blame culture here: try things, and take responsibility for the outcomes. You are always part of the wider Aker. We help our colleagues and take pride in successfully achieving difficult tasks. We run towards problems and help to solve them. Communicate always, do so accurately and in a timely fashion. In return, we offer a competitive salary, 25 days holiday plus bank holidays, company paid medical insurance and life assurance, pension scheme, annual training allowance, wellbeing allowance, virtual GP, Employee Assistance plan and more. Equal Opportunities Aker Systems fosters a diverse environment that encourages openness in its communications and is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people regardless of race, religion, gender or sexual orientation, age, marital status, national origin, citizenship status, disability, veteran status or other personal characteristics. We embrace differences of opinion and diversity because they help challenge us and find new groundbreaking technical solutions.