Software Engineer Contractor Jobs in Denver, CO (NOW HIRING)

Who We Are:
We're a high-growth software company with a big mission: empowering K-12 district teams to do more with less.
At LINQ, we get K12. That's why we help districts transform K-12 school operations with best-in-class, cloud-based software solutions built to help districts return more resources to classrooms. Integrating finance, HR, nutrition management, and payments into a single, secure platform, LINQ reduces administrative burden. LINQ is trusted by 30% of school districts across the U.S. to help them operate more efficiently and serve over 1 billion meals to 17 million students annually, process payroll for 364,000 educators, administrators, and staff, and engage with millions of families through the free LINQ Connect app.
Our team? They're talented, committed, and fiercely loyal problem-solvers. At LINQ, you'll find challenging and meaningful work, a team that respects and uplifts one another, and a commitment to constant improvement. Our customers love us because we're attentive, patient, communicative, and solutions focused. They know they can count on us to not only anticipate their needs but to deliver the right answer every time.
LINQ's Values:
• Act with Integrity & Build Trust: Trust is the foundation of our company. We operate with the highest standards of integrity, both internally and externally. We believe in transparency, honesty, and accountability. Building a culture where trust is earned and maintained.
• Deliver Excellence: We consistently exceed our clients' expectations. In every interaction, we strive to anticipate needs, provide swift solutions, and go the extra mile to relentlessly impress our customers. We communicate clearly, consistently, and in a timely way to cultivate lasting relationships.
• Embrace Challenges: We embrace a growth mindset. Challenges offer opportunities to learn, grow, and improve. Continuous learning keeps us relevant and effective to ensure our solutions remain on the leading edge of innovation.
• Collaborate & Act as One Team: Diverse skills, ideas, and perspectives are our strength. Through open communication, shared goals, and a spirit of unity and mutual respect, we collaborate to achieve excellence, drive innovation, and propel our company forward as a cohesive force.
About the Team
You'll be embedded in a product engineering team building one of LINQ's core products for parents/guardians and districts, which helps families manage student accounts - payments, balances, transaction history, and family/student management - across a React Native mobile app (your primary focus in this role), a companion web application, and a backend API.
Beyond your home product, you'll be the company's senior-most technical voice for mobile engineering. LINQ's ecosystem includes a number of native mobile applications across different products, and at a high level, you'll be the person other teams and leadership turn to when a mobile architecture, tooling, or platform decision needs to be made anywhere in that ecosystem.
About the Role
As a Staff Mobile Software Engineer, you will be the primary technical owner and lead of our flagship React Native mobile application (iOS + Android), while also serving as LINQ's de facto mobile engineering lead across the broader ecosystem of native apps the company maintains. You'll set technical direction and standards for mobile development company-wide, and provide hands-on technical leadership to teams of contractors working in mobile codebases - without formal people-management responsibility, but with real authority over architecture, code quality, and technical direction.
This is a mobile-first role: your primary responsibility and the majority of your time will be spent in that flagship mobile app. As capacity and need allow, you'll also contribute to and interface with its companion web application and backend API, giving you the full-stack context to make sound mobile architecture decisions and collaborate effectively with web and backend engineers.
Primary Objectives

• Mobile Technical Leadership: Own the architecture, technical direction, and quality bar for our flagship React Native mobile application. Be the final technical voice on non-trivial mobile design decisions.
• Company-Wide Mobile Authority: Act as LINQ's go-to mobile expert across the company's ecosystem of native apps - establishing and evangelizing shared mobile engineering standards, patterns, and best practices wherever mobile development happens.
• Contractor Technical Leadership: Provide day-to-day technical leadership to contractor engineers working in mobile codebases - setting direction, reviewing code, unblocking technical problems, and ensuring their work meets LINQ's engineering bar. (This is a technical leadership role, not a people-management role.)
• Cross-Stack Collaboration: Bring mobile-informed perspective to the broader product stack, contributing to web and backend work as needed to ship end-to-end features and keep the mobile, web, and backend experiences coherent.

What You'll Be Doing

• Design and build robust, scalable, secure features in our flagship mobile app (React Native, iOS + Android), owning the hardest and most ambiguous mobile technical problems.
• Set and maintain mobile engineering standards company-wide: architecture patterns, code quality practices, testing strategy, CI/CD, release/versioning process, app store submission and compliance, and crash/performance monitoring.
• Provide technical leadership to contractor engineers working on mobile: reviewing designs and code, mentoring on React Native and native iOS/Android practices, and making sure contractor work aligns with LINQ's architecture and standards.
• Diagnose and resolve the most complex mobile issues - performance, stability, native module, and platform-specific (iOS/Android) problems that require deep native expertise.
• Own production health for the mobile app: monitoring, crash triage, release quality, and app store standing.
• Contribute to the companion web application and backend API as needed - enough to ship cross-stack features and represent mobile constraints/needs in web and backend design discussions.
• Influence LINQ's broader technical roadmap and strategy as it relates to mobile, partnering with engineering leadership, product, and other technical leads.
• Actively participate in agile scrum ceremonies - sprint planning, reviews, retrospectives - and help the team continuously improve its process and delivery.
• Mentor engineers at all levels on mobile development, fostering a culture of technical excellence and continuous learning.

What We Are Looking For

• 10+ years of professional software development experience, with substantial depth in mobile application development.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, or equivalent working experience.
• Proven, production-grade experience building and shipping React Native applications (iOS + Android) at scale.
• Real, hands-on native mobile development experience - Swift/Xcode for iOS and/or Kotlin/Android Studio for Android - not just cross-platform (React Native) experience.
• Strong proficiency in TypeScript for cross-platform mobile development.
• Demonstrated ability to lead technically - setting architecture and direction, reviewing others' work, and raising the bar for a team - including experience guiding contractors or engineers you don't formally manage.
• Experience owning mobile CI/CD, release processes, and app store submission/compliance (Apple App Store and Google Play).
• Strong understanding of mobile app performance, stability, and production monitoring (crash reporting, analytics, remote config/feature flagging).
• Experience with Git for version control and working in an Agile/Scrum environment.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to communicate effectively with engineers, contractors, and leadership.
• Ability to describe, present, and influence architectural decisions across teams.

What Will Make You Stand Out

• Experience contributing to Angular-based web applications.
• Familiarity with C#/.NET, or general comfort navigating and contributing to backend/API codebases.
• Experience with common mobile SDKs used in production consumer apps: feature flagging, crash/analytics monitoring, authentication providers, and in-app support/engagement tools.
• Experience with localization/internationalization in a mobile app serving a multilingual user base.
• Experience in fintech, payments, or another domain with strong security and compliance requirements.
• Prior experience as a technical lead for distributed teams that include contractors, including cross-timezone collaboration.

The Tech
React Native, TypeScript, Swift, Kotlin, Angular, C#, SQL, Gi
Compensation:
We offer a competitive base annual salary of 140,000-$160,000 plus a 15% bonus.
Why You'll Love Working With Us
Planning Your Future: Our 401(k) plan comes with a 4% employer match on total earnings (not just your base salary).
Performance Pays Off: Whether it's a company bonus or target sales commission, your hard work doesn't go unnoticed.
Vacation Your Way: Our flexible Open Paid Time Off Plan lets you take the time you need, when you need it.
Paid Parental Leave: Take the time you need to welcome your new addition - We've got you covered!
Ten Paid Corporate Holidays: Enjoy a little extra downtime to relax and recharge with the ten paid holidays each year.
♥Giving Back: Feel good while doing good - 16 paid volunteer hours to support the causes that matter most to you. #LINQCares
Benefits That Have Your Back (And Teeth, Too!): Rock-solid medical, dental and vision coverage. Pick your vibe: a low deductible PPO and pair with an FSA or a HDHP with a sweet HSA - with contributions from LINQ. Dental perks that even cover braces for the kiddos.
Wellness Perks: Employer-paid Short-Term Disability, Long Term Disability, Basic Life, and AD&D insurance. Gym reimbursements and tons of extra savings on travel assistance, employee assistance, and even pet insurance options.
Rewards For Referrals: Got an amazing candidate in your network? Send them our way and earn a referral bonus when they join the team!
EOE Statement/Accommodation Notice:
As a federal contractor and equal employment opportunity employer, LINQ adheres to all applicable laws and regulations regarding employment practices, ensuring that all qualified individuals receive consideration for employment
based on their qualifications. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, pregnancy, genetic information, disability, status as a protected veteran, or any other protected category under applicable federal, state, and local law.
To learn more about your rights and protections under federal law, please refer to the EEOC Equal Employment Opportunity Poster at the following link: https://www.eeoc.gov/poster
If you'd like to view a copy of the company'sstate or federally required affirmative action plans or policy statement, please email HRHelp@linq.com. If you are an individual with a disability and would like to request a reasonable accommodation as part of the employment selection process, please contact HRHelp@linq.com. This email address is reserved solely for job seekers with disabilities requesting accessibility assistance or an accommodation in the job application process. Please do not use this email to inquire about the status of your job application if you do not require accessibility assistance or an accommodation. Messages left for other purposes, such as solicitation, following up on an application or non-disability related technical issues, will not receive a response.
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