AuthZed, Inc.

A Culture of Trust and Autonomy

At AuthZed, the cultural foundation is built on a single, powerful premise: "Trust each other." As a remote-first infrastructure startup, the company empowers its employees with the agency to shape the business and product without micromanagement. AuthZed values open-mindedness and healthy tension, encouraging team members to test assumptions, question biases, and engage in rigorous technical debates. Communication relies heavily on asynchronous written updates, protecting long blocks of deep-focus time while maintaining alignment across North American and European time zones.

What You'll Actually Do

AuthZed is tackling one of the most complex challenges in software engineering: building scalable, globally consistent authorization infrastructure. As a member of the engineering team, you will be deeply involved in developing and scaling SpiceDB, an open-source authorization system inspired by Google's Zanzibar paper. The work demands a strong grasp of distributed systems, database internals, and performance optimization. Engineers at AuthZed "operate what they build," meaning you will also take on on-call responsibilities to ensure the reliability of mission-critical enterprise services used by companies like Canva and Turo.

Compensation & Benefits

AuthZed is transparent about its compensation, publishing salary bands directly on its job postings. The company offers competitive baseline packages for a remote early-stage startup, alongside comprehensive U.S. healthcare coverage and a 3% employer contribution to 401(k) retirement plans. Employees also receive equity as part of their total rewards package. While the core benefits are strong, international candidates should be prepared to clarify regional coverage details during the hiring process, as most publicly available benefits information is tailored to U.S.-based roles.

The Interview Process

The interview process at AuthZed is designed to evaluate how you think and collaborate rather than your ability to memorize syntax or solve abstract LeetCode puzzles. It typically begins with a Background Panel to discuss your past technical decisions and engineering ownership. This is followed by a Technical Skills Panel, where you act as the technical lead in a collaborative session with two AuthZed engineers. You will tackle practical, ambiguous problems—such as distributed systems design or debugging—focusing on requirements gathering, architectural trade-offs, and reasoning through real-world constraints. The process emphasizes "thinking out loud" and navigating uncertainty.

Why Join / Why Not

Why Join: If you are passionate about distributed systems and want to work on foundational infrastructure that solves complex, real-world problems, AuthZed offers an exceptional opportunity. You will work alongside a highly talented, lean team of industry veterans in a remote-first environment that respects your time and autonomy. The transparency in compensation and the chance to contribute to a rapidly growing open-source project are significant draws.

Why Not: The "operate what you build" philosophy means engineers share on-call duties, which can lead to unpredictable workload spikes during incidents or major enterprise releases. Additionally, the high-autonomy, asynchronous culture requires strong self-direction; those who prefer highly structured, office-based environments or extensive day-to-day managerial guidance might find the setup challenging.