Head Developer for a Travel Startup that's Making the World a Better Place

[login to view URL] is the world’s leading platform for travel activities with a cause: immersive day experiences hosted by local “do-good” organizations. 100% of host revenue is invested back into the local community. [login to view URL] offers thousands of experiences in 80 countries. We believe that by 2020, every trip itinerary will include at least a half-day activity with a cause. Job Description The Head Developer role is to assure the successful execution of [login to view URL]’s business and social mission through development and deployment of our web and app presence. This requires envisioning [login to view URL]’s service offerings as a web and mobile business, leading implementation of applications, and planning for risk and growth. You will lead the design and development of our company’s software applications. In-depth knowledge and experience on application software development are required. Excellent design patterns and object-oriented programming methodology must be employed. This is an opportunity to drive the design and architecture of an application in a disruptive early-stage technology company focused on facilitating booking to tens of thousands off-the-map travel attractions. The ideal candidate will have experience bringing products to market and building scalable applications using agile methodologies. Essential job responsibilities will include the following. Other duties may be assigned as well. Roles and responsibilities - Work with Senior Leadership to develop strategies for product design, functionality, release and modular development. - Select the appropriate development platform for the SaaS future based on speed, cost, capacity, interoperability, scalability, & development talent. - Analyze business requirements and technical specifications, and architect solutions with high performance. - Identify and analyze security risks, and adapt policies and procedures to mitigate them. - Work in a Rapid Application Development lifecycle with high velocity and multiple sprints. - Lead development and maintenance of the existing Ruby on Rails site and Wordpress blog. - Manage and maintain test driven development and continuous integration tools. - Recruit and build a winning technology team - Oversee the QA team - Serve as captain of the technology team on all fronts Knowledge, skills, and abilities - Proven leadership ability. - Ready to take on the monumental challenge of disrupting the travel industry by allowing direct booking from nonprofit providers on the ground, bypassing 3rd party travel companies. - Excellent knowledge and work experience in designing and developing complex software applications. - Highly experienced in popular server technology (Ruby on Rails, Heroku/AWS). - Experienced in n-tier design, separating presentation layer, business logic layer and data access layer. - Experienced with front-end development with Coffeescript, HTML5, CSS3, and jQuery. - Need to show proven experience in building websites. - Experience with pgSQL server is required. - Experienced with Agile software engineering processes and methodologies. - Must be a fast learner and self-starter. Be able to come up to speed on new applications and technology in a very short amount of time. - Must be details oriented, with strong analytic and problem-solving skills. - High degree of self-motivation. Must be able to plan and execute work both independently and as a team member. - Ability to prioritize and manage several tasks at once. - Penchant for creativity and using code to express individual ideas. Education and experience - BS degree in computer science or systems engineering required; MS in CS preferred. - At least 2 years of direct work experience in software development with - Ruby on Rails or similar frameworks. - Experience building software for online communities preferred. - Experience building web application for large-scale customer audience. - Comfort with working with sales, finance, and HR dorks.