Senior Full Stack Engineer at Socket - Series C Security in Columbus
Career & Market Insight
Early-Stage Opportunity with High Leverage — This is a genuine 0-to-1 full-stack role at a well-funded Series C security startup ($125M raised). You'd be shaping both product and culture, not executing someone else's roadmap. That's rare, but it demands strong ownership instincts and tolerance for ambiguity.
Compensation Context: No salary is disclosed, but Socket mentions "market competitive salary bands" and a "meaningful equity program." At this stage and in the cybersecurity/DevSecOps space, senior full-stack engineers at VC-backed companies typically earn $160K–$220K+ USD in base, with meaningful early-stage equity. The interview process explicitly states leveling is aligned dynamically, so the range depends heavily on your demonstrated seniority.
Skills Development: The stack (Node.js, React, TypeScript, Postgres, GraphQL, ElasticSearch) is highly marketable. Experience with supply chain security tooling and data pipelines is increasingly valuable as DevSecOps grows. Working in a small, fast-moving team will sharpen your end-to-end product instincts significantly.
Green Flags:
- Named customers including Anthropic, Figma, and Vercel — strong market validation.
- Founder has major open source credibility; engineering culture likely values craft.
- Interview process is thorough (7 stages) — signals they hire carefully and value fit.
Watch For: "Move with urgency" and "ruthless prioritization" language at an early-stage company can mean significant work intensity. Ensure work-life expectations are discussed explicitly during the process.
About Us
Socket helps devs and security teams ship faster by cutting out security busywork. Thousands of orgs use Socket to safely find, audit, and manage open source code. Our customers — from Anthropic to xAI, and Figma to Vercel — love Socket (just check out their tweets to see for yourself!)
Founded by Feross Aboukhadijeh, a long-time open source maintainer with software downloaded over a billion times a month, Socket has raised $125M in funding from top angels, operators, and security leaders.
About the Role
Build product: This role will require you to move fast, prioritize ruthlessly, and be focused on the end user. Your voice will be essential in shaping the product and the roadmap, and your decisions will have immediate and far-reaching impact. You will work in collaboration with the engineering and design teams.
Grow the team and culture: As an early member of the team, you will form the defining DNA for the company's culture and our future team. Our ability to build a market-defining product is solely dependent on the culture we foster.
Set up foundational frameworks: You'll join at the genesis of something totally new and come into a fast-paced environment. We value process-driven systems that enable us to work smarter as we scale, and you'll build out design systems that will serve as guide rails for the engineering team.
What You'll Do
Contribute to the development of the Socket web application end-to-end
Work with the design team to develop interfaces that abstract away complexities and deliver an elegant and delightful user experience
Write APIs to deliver data from multiple data sources
Extract and transform data from 3rd party APIs
Help shape the roadmap and plan sprints that allow us to quickly deliver features and be agile to user feedback
Be a key part of hiring, including interviewing and providing input into team growth decisions
What You'll Bring
You've worked on an early stage team in a 0-1 role and would like to get back to building the foundations again
Experience with designing and implementing production web applications
Experience with building and integrating APIs and relational databases like Postgres
Proficiency with Node.js, JavaScript, React, and TypeScript
Not bound to a particular tech stack and can learn new technologies on-the-go
Bonus points for experience with any of the following: GraphQL, ElasticSearch, headless browsers, data pipelines
Our Interview Process
Informational with a member from our Talent Team
Hiring Manager Interview
Technical Interviews
Debrief
Final Interview with Feross
References
Decision/Offer
Leveling and compensation will be aligned dynamically throughout the interview process to match your technical scope and background.
Hiring is a big decision on both sides. Read more about our Hiring Philosophy and how we approach the process at Socket.
Benefits
Our benefits are crafted to support you and your family, so you can take care of what matters most and thrive in and outside of work. We offer:
Market competitive salary bands
Meaningful equity program
Comprehensive health benefits for you and your family (99% coverage)
Flexible time-off, holidays, and winter shutdown to rest & recharge
Paid parental leave
Remote-first, with quarterly team off-sites
At Socket, we
Pursue Excellence: We set ourselves apart by consistently delivering work of exceptional quality and distinction.
Move with urgency and focus: We prioritize swift, decisive action.
Think rigorously: We care about being right and it often takes reasoning from first principles to get there. We value alternative perspectives and have constructive discussions.
Trust and amplify: We overtrust, always assume good intent, and give specific feedback to help each other improve.
Feel a strong sense of ownership: We wear many hats and feel a strong sense of overall ownership of the company and we're non-territorial regarding our nominal domains.
Are customer obsessed: We relentlessly prioritize the needs of our customers, striving to exceed their expectations and delight them at every interaction.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is this full stack engineer role fully remote?
What is the salary range for this position?
What tech stack does Socket use for this role?
How many interview stages does Socket's process have?
Is this a senior-level role or is it open to different experience levels?
