Wayfair

Boston, MA | Posted: 4 years ago

Software Architect

Wayfair is the premier destination to shop for a Zillion Things Home across 5,000 brands. Our supply chain is becoming an increasingly visible component to Wayfair's core strategy. The Warehouse Management Systems team, which owns the software, systems, and processes running inside our fulfillment centers, is a critical piece of that strategy. We prototype, build, and scale the tools used by our warehouse operations staff to pick, pack, and ship customer orders. We pride ourselves on driving accuracy and on-time delivery as order volume increases and the distribution network evolves to serve the volume.

We build and support a variety of technologies created in-house, as well as integrations with best-in-breed vendors. Technology in our warehouses is growing by leaps and bounds with the inclusion of automation, supplier self-service, and learning from rapid experimentation. Prototyping is at the heart of our culture and generates the data used in our data-driven decisions. We welcome new ideas from a diverse set of backgrounds and encourage innovation at all levels.

The warehouse is a key driver in increasing delivery speed, driving down cost in the supply chain, and delighting our customers.

WMS started with one single warehouse serving the entire US. We now have a network of fulfillment centers, cross docks, and pool points throughout the US, UK, and EU. We are in the midst of creating new warehouse functionality while increasing availability of items that can be delivered in 2 days or less. Small, medium, and large parcel items are all included in the network and pose exciting challenges when designing the next phase of fulfillment technology. Here are some recent projects that have pushed our global fulfillment network forward in its speed and product availability.

• Automated product handling to minimize labor per order


• Predictive analytics to eliminate damaged items before they enter the supply chain


• Supplier recall capabilities to enable new product categories in the warehouse


• Order picking rules engine based on expiration date


• Small, medium, and large parcel handling in the same facility


• Customized Android devices to improve warehouse staff efficiency


• Flexible routing to enable optimal delivery speed and cost

We are never done. Warehousing has an exciting roadmap to continually improve the customer experience, add new capabilities, and minimize cost. We have large ambitions to further enhance our world class supply chain and require the best and brightest to make it happen. The next generation warehouses will have extensive automation, flexible configurations that conform to the consumer demands, and real time feedback on operations.

What You'll Do

• Lead technical roadmaps, design, and implementation across multiple teams of high performing engineers that will shape the future of Wayfair's supply chain.


• Actively encourage and participate in debate to form strong opinions weakly held


• Motivates and influence teams to buy into vision and roadmap, pushing individuals outside of their comfort zones where necessary


• Drive high impact architectural decisions including inception, design, and delivery


• Obsessively focus on production readiness for the team including testing, monitoring, deployment, and proactive troubleshooting


• Identify risks and gaps in product offerings that drive revenue or cost out and lead non-trivial initiatives to address those needs


• Externally recognized as credible technical and product subject matter expert for broader team's focus area


• Create proposals and action plans to garner support across the organization


• Drive implementation and provide visibility to progress through short feedback loops and data-driven action

Who You Are:

• Proficient in cross-functional consensus building and influencing without authority


• Mastery in designing production systems at scale including fault tolerance, reliability, performance, and security


• Mastery in effective troubleshooting and issue resolution techniques


• Mastery of a server side programming language (PHP preferred but not required)


• Mastery of a frontend framework (React preferred but not required)


• Mastery of writing SQL queries against a relational database