Jobs at Netflix - One down, one to go...

I have been working on hiring for the last month or so. We found and hired one good match and had a bunch of near misses, so I have revised a reissued job description that is clearer about what we are looking for. I need one more senior Java/SQL developer with experience of large scale consumer web site development. We are looking for someone who has a lot of experience in product development, may have spent some time in management or team lead roles, but still "has their head in the code". We run small agile teams, you get to architect and code new product features yourself and deliver to the site every few weeks.

My group develops core personalization algorithms that are used to generate lists of candidate movies and filter them down to the top few to be shown in any particular block on the site. We work on the pages grouped under the main "Browse DVDs" tab at www.netflix.com. We collaborate with a sister group that collects and predicts star ratings and runs the Netflix Prize, they work on pages under the "Movie's You'll Love" tab.

The business logic is written in Java, pulling its data out of Oracle and via middle tier services. The front end presentation layer (javascript/CSS etc.) work is done by engineers working for Bill Scott, Director of UI Engineering, who used to work at Yahoo! where he was chief AJAX evangelist. He is also hiring....

Development is very rapid, agile and iterative. Features go through rigorous statistical A/B testing, and have to show a significant benefit before all the users get to see them. There is a great deal of freedom to try out ideas and an extremely analytical approach to picking the winners.

Netflix is also something of a social experiment, the company culture is unique and very employee oriented. There is minimal process, a huge reliance on personal judgement, and zero tolerance for antisocial behaviors. What would normally be a fat binder of HR policies has been summarized into a few lines: "Act in Netflix's best interest" and the vacation policy is "take some". If you don't have the personal judgement to do the right thing, we say goodbye...

Web Engineering consists of a relatively small number of senior people working very efficiently and productively. We like to hire the best "stars" we can find and build up "bench strength" like a championship winning sports team. We are looking for some more star talent...

Here is the opening: http://jobs.netflix.com/DetailFlix.asp?flix1916 

I'm hiring one engineer at this time - apply at the above link or find me in LinkedIn or FaceBook to discuss.