Back-end Developer (Laravel)

Are you passionate about Tech and ready to use your skills to change the world of work forever?
Join blackbear as Back-end Developer and be at the forefront of innovation with us!

About blackbear

Hi, I'm Joep, Co-Founder of blackbear. My Co-Founder Stefan and I launched blackbear to address a common challenge in today's labour market: the need for flexibility and quality in work. Our mission is to change the way the world gets work done.

We know the struggles faced in finding flexible work solutions - we’ve experienced it first-hand. That's why we're dedicated to bridging capacity gaps with tailored solutions by offering a platform ready for the future of work.

Our platform connects organizations with freelance talent, enabling flexible, secure, and efficient work without sacrificing quality. By blending agency and freelance work seamlessly, we're reshaping the future of work. At blackbear, we're not just filling capacity gaps; we're redefining how work gets done.

Blackbear is a scale-up with a distinct character. Everyone who works with us shares the same drive for excellence and growth. Now, as we gear up to take our services global, it's time to supercharge our tech efforts. We want to shake things up, push boundaries, and take our success to a whole new level.

Currently, we're transitioning our organisation to a product-centric approach and expanding our development team. If you're an experienced Engineering Lead eager to contribute your skills and creativity to our mission, we'd love to hear from you. Let's shape the future of work together!

About the role

At the core of our organisation lies a small yet dynamic Tech team that is on the brink of expansion. Currently the team consists of a Back-end Developer, a Front-end Developer, a QA Engineer, a UX/UI designer and a Product Owner.

With this ambitious group of individuals, we are on a mission to revolutionise the way work is done, and we are looking for an experienced leader who wants to combine their strong vision on Tech strategies with hands-on responsibilities to execute this vision and ensure operational excellence.

As a Back-end Developer, you will oversee the development lifecycle of our back-end API, significantly contribute to the versatility and growth of our Tech team, and foster innovation and excellence in our development practices.

More specifically, you will:

• Collaborate effectively with the rest of the Tech team members to deliver high-quality solutions.

• Work with other teams to troubleshoot/determine the resolution for complex issues across team domains.

• Be an internal consultant for our internal stakeholders and translate the business needs to a functional solution.

• Work independently on projects where you are fully in control of the execution.

• Be proactive and collaborative within your projects, always sharing your ideas and opinions to further enhance the outcomes.

• Bring the bigger picture of a project to life with your engineering and problem-solving mindset.

• Share your passion for coding, showcasing an innovative engineering mindset.

Blackbear is a scale-up with a distinct character. Everyone who works with us shares the same drive for excellence and growth.

For our next Back-end Developer, we ask the following:

• Available from April 2024 for a minimum of 32 hours per week.

• At least 6 years of experience with Back-end Development.

• You are truly passionate about coding and engineering and are excited to share your expertise.

• You are a master of PHP, Laravel and MySQL.

• Experience in scaling larger projects, handling high infrastructure loads, and elevating engineering practices to higher standards.

• Some experience with DevOps, showcasing the ability to manage servers effectively.

• You are a confident decision-maker who takes ownership of projects and can guide and mentor team members.

• Familiarity with Statamic is a plus.

• Experience with working in teams - if you have led a small team or have worked in large teams, this is a plus.

• Residing in the Netherlands, and you can commute to our office in Schiphol-Rijk.

• English working proficiency.

About the team

Our Tech Stack

• We have a monolithic architecture, with good test coverage.
• Our main stack consists of PHP 8.3, Laravel, MySQL, Vue3, Typescript, and Tailwind.
• Our internal admin panel is built using Filament.
• We use tools and services including Linear, GitHub, Cloudflare, and Stripe.

Our Processes

We work using the Shape Up method, focusing on 2 - 6 week cycles to build impactful features that redefine how the working world collaborates. We use this method because we believe empowered teams drive real change. The entire team is involved in the process of shaping the solution.

Why we like it:

• Fixed time, variable scope: Say goodbye to estimations (let’s be honest, they are rarely realistic). We shape a solution and scope it to fit a given period of time so that we can deliver something valuable to our end users.
• Identify problems early: Product development teams have the tools necessary to define problems in detail before the work on solutions starts
• Protect focus: You get to focus on one single feature at the time as sole-focus. No bug fixing in between or other distractions.
• Fewer meetings: Minimum meetings and when we do, we make them matter.
• Time for us: Gives us time in between-cycles to do general housekeeping or learning new skills.

Our process isn't set in stone. We're still experimenting and open to identifying the most efficient recipe for continued success, you will play an important role in shaping this process.

What we build

You could describe our platform as a SaaS enabled Marketplace.
These are the few of the exciting projects we have on our roadmap in the upcoming months:

• AI-job description: create a high-quality job description with minimum effort
• Real-time collaboration: seamless centralised communication & collaboration via our platform
• Vetted professionals: recommend & select the best professional for the job with minimum effort
• Professional pools: your preferred professionals ready & available to work with you
• Interactive product demos: let customers experience the value of our product early on
• Get Projects done with blackbear: professionals working in teams; splitting their earnings and deliver complex solutions
• Emails & campaigns: enable our teams to build fledged campaigns inside our platform to ensure customer success and tailored support for each account.

Here is a snapshot of our application:

What we offer

At blackbear, we embrace a strong sense of purpose, ownership, collaboration, and mutual trust - all driving us towards reaching our ambitious goals.

As Back-end Developer, you will get the unique opportunity to play a key role in the future of blackbear and you will get the freedom to propose, shape and implement your ideas.

➡️ You’re part of one of the fastest-growing Tech companies in The Netherlands.

➡️ The opportunity to participate in our equity plans.

➡️ An annual personal development budget.

➡️ Vacation allowance of 8% paid on a monthly basis and 25 paid vacation days.

➡️ Pension plan contribution by blackbear and solid parental leave policies.

➡️ Commute reimbursements and working-from-home allowances.

➡️ Hybrid working: 3 days remote and 2 days in the office per week (our future is looking remote).
➡️ Great gear - a high-end laptop and whatever else you need to succeed.

➡️ Healthy lunches and snacks are provided in our office.

➡️ An international working environment with driven colleagues and ample social activities.

Our recruitment process

1. Initial chat with our People Business Partner to discuss your motivation, experience and the position to assess if there is a mutual fit for the role.
2. An interview with our Head of Product to further discuss your profile and motivation for the role. Here you get the opportunity to deep-dive into the position, the team and the vision for the future.
3. A technical interview with our development team to understand your general motivation for the role, followed by a one-part coding exercise, completed as peer programming to assess your relevant technical experience and experience how we would collaborate.
4. Culture check. You will have a conversation with one of our founders to get a sense of what we’re planning as a company, assess the cultural fit and see what future opportunities can be in store for you. Additionally, you will have a meeting with the team to get to know each other and ensure there’s a personal and professional match.
5. Reference check.

Apply today, make an impact tomorrow

If our mission resonates with you, and you'd like to be part of a collaborative and innovative team driving a product's success, we'd love to hear from you. Please send us your CV and any relevant project links or repositories.