Forward Financing is a financial technology company based in Boston, Massachusetts with team members throughout the United States, Dominican Republic, and Canada. The company is on a mission to unlock the capital that fuels small businesses across America. Recognized as a Best Place to Work by Built In Boston and certified as a Great Place To Work®, Forward is investing in its employees, technology, and customer experience – with long-term success in mind every step of the way.

Forward Financing is a financial technology company headquartered in Boston, MA with an operational hub in the Dominican Republic, a satellite office in Salt Lake City, Utah and a growing team in Canada. Forward is on a mission to unlock the capital that fuels small businesses across America. Recognized as a Best Place to Work by Built In Boston and certified as a Great Place To Work®, Forward is investing in its employees, technology, and customer experience – with long-term success in mind every step of the way.

Our Engineering team serves as a key driver of innovation at Forward Financing. We build the software that powers a FinTech product that serves Small Businesses across the country. A key part of our strategy involves leveraging data from dozens of sources to power our AI/ML initiatives and our analytical capabilities. We're looking for an experienced Senior Software Engineer to join our team, responsible for the systems that power our online (real-time) feature store — the infrastructure that serves ML features to production models with low latency and high reliability.

In this role you will:

• Design, build, and operate the online feature store — the real-time serving layer that delivers ML features to production models with low latency and strong consistency guarantees

• Build and maintain data pipelines (batch and streaming) that compute, validate, and publish features from source systems into the online and offline stores

• Work on the data models and Postgres schemas that back real-time feature serving, optimizing for query performance, freshness, and scale

• Act as a technical leader for feature store infrastructure; help drive enhancements to quality, scalability, reliability, and observability for the systems ML models depend on

• Partner closely with our Data Science, Analytics Engineering, Product Management, and Application Development teams to translate business requirements into production-grade engineering solutions

• Contribute to mentoring for junior engineers

• Contributing to best practices and raising the bar through thoughtful code reviews and contributions to technical design discussions

Why you should apply:

• Mission-driven company: Forward is a trusted source of fast, flexible funding for small businesses that have often been underserved by traditional financing options. When you join the team, you will help ensure all small businesses have access to the financial support they need to succeed.

• Flexibility is a top priority: Our employees are empowered to choose where they want to work (whether that's from home, in the office, or a combination of both).

Role Requirements:

• 5+ years of software experience, with a focus on backend systems (Python required) and 2-3 years of MLOps experience

• Strong experience with relational databases (Postgres preferred) — schema design, query optimization, and operating databases under production load

• Experience building and operating real time inference systems

• Understanding of the unique reliability and correctness demands of ML-serving infrastructure (data freshness, training/serving skew, feature consistency)

• Experience in mutli-service architectures and design patterns

• Experience in Agile software development

• Typically has a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Data Engineering, or a related field, or additional relevant experience

Bonus Qualifications:

• Experience with feature stores (e.g., Feast, Tecton, SageMaker Feature Store) or building an equivalent system in-house

• Experience with MLOps tooling (e.g., MLflow, Airflow, dbt) and ML model deployment/serving patterns

• Experience designing and implementing complex systems across multiple software applications and/or languages

• Excellent written and verbal communication

• Ability to influence others

• Demonstrated project management skills

Compensation:
Annual Salary: $175,000 - $220,000 CAD
Annual Bonus: You have the potential to earn an additional 10% annual bonus.

At Forward Financing, we're committed to fair and transparent compensation. We believe in providing a compensation package that recognizes your skills, experience, and the unique value you bring to our team. We take a market-based approach to pay, regularly reviewing benchmark data to ensure our compensation remains competitive, equitable, and aligned with our performance-driven culture.

Final offers are determined by a variety of factors, including the candidate's qualifications, relevant experience, specific skills, and internal equity. This approach ensures that our compensation is competitive and equitable. Your recruiter will provide specific details on the expected base and variable earnings as it pertains to this specific role. This position is to fill an existing vacancy.

Our Core Values:

• Drive the Mission: We believe in financial opportunity for underserved small businesses. We say “yes” when others say “no.”

• Keep It Real: We value direct communication, candid feedback, and authenticity. We are an open book.

• Act With Kindness: We create an environment where caring is cool and helping is the norm. We do the right thing.

• Shoot for Extraordinary: We are inspired by innovative thinking and continuous improvement. We never settle for yesterday’s best.

About Us:

Forward Financing is a financial technology company based in Boston, Massachusetts with an operational hub in Santiago, Dominican Republic, on a mission to unlock the capital that fuels small businesses across America. Whether facing challenges accessing traditional financing or simply needing a convenient, flexible solution, Forward is committed to funding more of the millions of small businesses nationwide. Forward offers revenue-based financing – delivering an upfront sum of working capital in exchange for a set amount of the business’s future revenue. By simplifying the requirements, streamlining the process, and using advanced proprietary technology, Forward is often able to deliver approvals within hours and funds that same day – giving more businesses the financial opportunity they need to thrive. Plus, with their dedicated teams and award-winning service, customers get personalized support when they need it most.

Since 2012, Forward has expanded access to capital by providing over $3.5 billion in funding to more than 71,000 small businesses. The company is A+ rated by the Better Business Bureau with an Excellent / 4.7 stars rating on Trustpilot.com. Recognized as a Best Place to Work by Built In Boston and certified as a Great Place To Work®, Forward is dedicated to empowering both its team and the customers they serve, helping them succeed and thrive.

Total Rewards:

Additionally, we offer a comprehensive total rewards package, including but not limited to: medical, dental, vision, a flexible time-off policy, paid parental leave, RRSP match, wellness reimbursement, volunteering days, annual professional development budget, and charitable donation match.

Forward is proud to be a remote-first company, keeping workplace flexibility a top priority for our employees. As a business, we are focused on impact; we are more concerned with your contributions to the success of the company than where you get your work done. To help facilitate in-person collaboration, employees are welcome to work from one of our premiere office locations.

When we aren’t collaborating to drive business and support our customers, we’re finding virtual and in-person ways to get to know our colleagues, celebrate team wins, and have fun together!

Equal Opportunity Employment Information

It is the policy of Forward Financing to ensure equal employment opportunity without discrimination or harassment on the basis of race, religion, national origin, status, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital or domestic/civil partnership status, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or any other basis protected by law. We welcome and encourage applications from people with disabilities. Please let us know should you require any accommodations. As part of our commitment to a streamlined and equitable hiring experience, we use AI tools to assist with candidate screening and assessment.