Principal Security Engineer - Application Security

About Gusto

Gusto is a modern, online people platform that helps small businesses take care of their teams. On top of full-service payroll, Gusto offers health insurance, 401(k)s, expert HR, and team management tools. Today, Gusto offices in Denver, San Francisco, and New York serve more than 300,000 businesses nationwide.

Our mission is to create a world where work empowers a better life, and it starts right here at Gusto. That’s why we’re committed to building a collaborative and inclusive workplace, both physically and virtually. Learn more about our Total Rewards philosophy. 

About the role:

The Security Engineering role works with product and engineering leads to design products and features with the safety and privacy of our customers in mind. Candidates for this role will be joining a team focused on building long-term relationships between the Security team and internal stakeholders across the company, providing guidance on security risks and mitigation, and secure development architecture. More about Security Partners on the Gusto blog.

The Product Security group helps Gusto move faster, securely. We’re a team of engineers who work to enable other teams to build products as quickly as possible while continuing to protect our customers. We support developers in shipping secure code by building security tools and services, providing security training and expertise, and advocating for best practices in authentication, authorization, and safe data handling across the company.

Here’s what you’ll do day-to-day:

• Work alongside product, engineering, infrastructure, legal, and privacy teams to design safe features to protect our customers.
• Review and threat model new systems, products, and features.
• Provide detailed security advice and risk assessments, including architectural direction.
• Develop guidelines and recommendations for secure coding practices.
• Lead and manage secure code training instruction.
• Implement and deploy application security tools.
• Develop long-term relationships with product development and engineering teams.

Here’s what we're looking for:

• 12+ years of experience in information security, especially application security, product security, and/or security partnership.
• 5+ years of hands on software development experience 
• Ability to work with engineers to balance security risks, customer privacy, and business requirements.
• Experience building software. We primarily use Ruby, JavaScript, Python, and Kotlin.

Our cash compensation amount for this role is targeted at $225,000/yr to $245,000/yr in Denver & most remote locations, and $265,000/yr to $285,000/yr in New York & San Francisco Bay Area. Stock equity is additional. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors including candidate experience and expertise and may vary from the amounts listed above.

Gusto has physical office spaces in Denver, San Francisco, and New York City. Employees who are based in those locations will be expected to work from the office on designated days approximately 2-3 days per week (or more depending on role). The same office expectations apply to all Symmetry roles, Gusto's subsidiary, whose physical office is in Scottsdale.

Note: The San Francisco office expectations encompass both the San Francisco and San Jose metro areas. 

When approved to work from a location other than a Gusto office, a secure, reliable, and consistent internet connection is required.

Our customers come from all walks of life and so do we. We hire great people from a wide variety of backgrounds, not just because it's the right thing to do, but because it makes our company stronger. If you share our values and our enthusiasm for small businesses, you will find a home at Gusto. 

Gusto is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate in hiring or any employment decision based on race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), marital status, ancestry, physical or mental disability, genetic information, veteran status, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or other applicable legally protected characteristic. Gusto considers qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law. Gusto is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans in our job application procedures. We want to see our candidates perform to the best of their ability. If you require a medical or religious accommodation at any time throughout your candidate journey, please fill out this form and a member of our team will get in touch with you.

Gusto takes security and protection of your personal information very seriously. Please review our Fraudulent Activity Disclaimer.