Overview

GiveDirectly (GD) aims to reshape international giving – by providing cash grants directly to the world’s poorest. The Brookings Institution estimates that $70B of cash transfers would be required to eliminate the poverty gap; the aid sector currently spends $135B each year, much of it on evidence-free interventions. GiveDirectly wants to change that, establishing cash transfers as a benchmark for foreign aid – as the index fund is a benchmark for the financial industry – and in the process accelerating the end of extreme poverty.

GD has raised over $1B since launching in 2011, delivered cash to more than 1.5 million people in 15 different countries. We’ve also supported large-scale, experimental research that indicates strong recipient impact of our programs. GD has been celebrated as one of the most innovative non-profit companies by Fast Company, and the growing cash transfer movement has been featured in the New York Times Magazine, This American Life, Foreign Affairs, and The Economist.

Our culture is candid, analytical, agile, and non-hierarchical. Our global team of ~150, and country operations teams of ~650, together come from 21 different countries speaking 69 different languages. From software engineers to humanitarian workers, management consultants to public servants, researchers to field operations – it’s an incredible group of people.

Our values are central and deliberately opinionated. We center the people we serve in our decision making, and strive to build an ambitious, dynamic and high performing environment. We encourage you to read through our values carefully to see if they reflect how you like to work.

We work to create an environment in which all our team members can thrive, succeed and grow. We support flexibility, take care of each other, have fun, and create professional growth opportunities.

Location: This role is fully remote but must be available to meet with East Africa timezone by at least 2 hours a couple of times a week. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of employment Visas in the U.S. or U.K. at this time.

About this role

Technology plays a central role in how GiveDirectly delivers cash—whether identifying recipients in hard-to-reach places, sending payments quickly after disasters, or powering the platforms our donors use to give.

We’re hiring a Senior Software Engineer to help build the systems behind this work. Our engineering team still operates like a startup within GiveDirectly—lean, fast-moving, and high-autonomy. You’ll lean into product thinking, help shape the roadmap, and collaborate closely across disciplines to solve real-world problems. The specific team you’ll join is still being finalized — it could be:

• Our Programs Engineering team (getting cash in the hands of people experiencing extreme poverty)
• Our Fundraising Engineering team (raising more money for recipients)
• Our International Rapid Response team (getting cash to disaster-affected communities within 5 days of a crisis—anywhere in the world)

No matter the team, you’ll play a central role in scaling our impact: getting more money, to more people, more efficiently.

This is a hands-on role with real ownership. You’ll help shape architecture, ship production-ready code, and work side-by-side with teammates across product, data, and operations. We’re looking for someone excited to wear multiple hats, move quickly, and define what great engineering looks like in a mission-driven org.

Level: Senior Software Engineer

Travel: Must be able to travel ~1-2 times per year to one of our countries of operation for team retreats or field visits.

What you’ll do

• Design and build scalable, reliable systems that power our core operations—donor platforms, systems that deliver payments to recipients, or crisis response tools reaching hundreds of thousands of people globally.
• Own end-to-end development of new features and services, from architecture through deployment and monitoring.
• Improve our developer workflows by strengthening CI/CD pipelines, reducing manual steps, and increasing test coverage.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (product, ops, data) to understand real-world needs and ship tools that directly support program delivery in the field.
• Debug and resolve production issues across our stack, with a focus on root cause analysis and long-term fixes.
• Advocate for sustainable engineering practices, including testing, documentation, and monitoring.
• Help shape our tech roadmap with an eye toward scale, maintainability, and recipient experience.

What you’ll bring

• Excellent alignment with GiveDirectly values and core competencies: emotional intelligence, problem solving, project management, follow-through, and fostering inclusivity. We encourage applicants from low-income or historically marginalized communities to apply.
• 4+ years of industry experience creating production-caliber software and systems.
• Experience with backend architecture: databases, cloud services, APIs; experience building infrastructure to deploy software.
• Experience with strongly-typed, object-oriented programming such as Java, C#, Go, etc., and scripting languages such as Python, Ruby, etc.
• High ownership and autonomy; proactively improve systems and leave codebase in a better state.
• Strong analytical skills and communication; ability to break down complex problems and collaborate with cross-functional partners.
• Bonus: experience using Python and AWS in production; experience with payments/financial software and/or microservice/serverless architecture.

Compensation

At GiveDirectly, compensation is designed to be generous and equitable. We use a third-party salary aggregator to ensure total compensation falls within the 75th percentile for similar roles, and we have a no-negotiation policy to ensure equity across roles. Read more about our compensation philosophy here.

• The United States annual base salary for this role is $157,500
• The Kenya annual base salary for this role is $92,500 USD
• The UK annual base salary for this role is GBP 108,150

This role is fully remote; if you are not based in the US, UK or Kenya, we will share an estimated salary benchmark for the country you are based in during the hiring process.

Why work at GiveDirectly?

We offer a positive and supportive team with opportunities for advancement, a commitment to staff development, a competitive salary including bonus, robust health benefits (varies by country), unlimited PTO, desk allowance, and flexible work location.

About this specific hiring process

• Take-home coding assignment
• Live Coding (60 mins)
• Systems Design (60 mins)
• Project Deep Dive + Behavioral (60 mins)

Note: adjustments to the interview process may occur and will be communicated during the process.

Working at GiveDirectly

GiveDirectly is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants are considered for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability, or any other characteristic protected by law.

We also provide information for US applicants on rights for applicants.

Commitment to Safeguarding

GD is committed to safeguarding recipients, staff, and partners. We are a member of safeguarding schemes and conduct pre-hire screens, including reference checks, criminal background checks, and sanction checks. We uphold a policy of zero tolerance for sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment (SEAH).

These efforts help us build trust with communities and prevent harm to recipients.

Voluntary Self-Identification

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