Senior Software Engineer

C.H. Robinson is seeking a Senior Software Engineer to join our Plan/Optimizer team within Technology. Our mission is to build the intelligent planning platform that helps customers answer one of the most challenging questions in logistics: What is the optimal way to move freight through my network? As part of this team, you will develop platforms and services that combine optimization, automation, business rules, and operational intelligence to generate actionable shipment plans at scale.

You'll work on systems that evaluate thousands of potential transportation decisions while balancing cost, service, utilization, constraints, and customer-specific business objectives.

The technology you build powers Navisphere Optimizer and other planning capabilities that enable customers to minimize transportation spend, maximize trailer utilization, reduce total miles traveled, and improve supply chain performance.

We're looking for engineers who enjoy tackling difficult distributed systems and decisioning problems and who are excited by the intersection of software engineering, optimization, AI, and logistics. If you're passionate about building highly automated systems that help customers make better decisions, we'd love to hear from you.

• This role can be based only in MN, IL or Kansas City
• Duties & Responsibilities
• Design and build the next generation of C.H. Robinson's planning and optimization platform that helps customers make intelligent freight planning decisions at scale
• Contribute to the technical roadmap and architectural direction of optimization, planning, and workflow orchestration services
• Design, develop, and operate resilient, scalable, and highly available cloud-native services that support critical supply chain planning capabilities
• Build platforms and services that evaluate transportation constraints, business rules, cost, service levels, capacity, and customer objectives to generate actionable shipment plans
• Design and develop proof of concepts (POCs) to evaluate emerging technologies and validate new approaches to optimization, automation, and intelligent decisioning
• Develop APIs, event-driven services, and workflow orchestration capabilities that enable planning solutions to integrate seamlessly across the enterprise
• Partner closely with Product Managers, Supply Chain Engineers, Data Scientists, Architects, and business stakeholders to translate customer needs into scalable technical solutions
• Design systems that balance configurability, maintainability, and performance while supporting diverse customer planning scenarios
• Mentor and influence other engineers through technical leadership, design reviews, code reviews, and knowledge sharing
• Evaluate and leverage AI-assisted development tools, intelligent automation, and emerging technologies to improve engineering productivity and platform capabilities
• Stay current on advancements in distributed systems, optimization technologies, AI, automation, and modern software engineering practices
• Required Qualifications
• 6+ years of experience designing and implementing large-scale software products or distributed systems that span multiple applications and services
• Experience leading technical design and delivering complex initiatives from concept through production
• Experience developing proof of concepts and transforming innovative ideas into scalable production solutions
• Experience with modern development languages and frameworks (ex. .NET Core, C#)
• Experience designing and developing cloud-native applications and services (ex. Azure, AWS, GCP)
• Experience with relational and non-relational databases (ex. SQL Server, Oracle, MongoDB, Cosmos DB, Elasticsearch)
• Experience with microservices, CQRS, event-driven architectures, asynchronous messaging, and eventually consistent systems
• Experience with streaming platforms and integration technologies (ex. Kafka, Event Hubs, ESB)
• Experience designing and consuming RESTful APIs and event-driven integration patterns
• Experience establishing testing strategies, acceptance criteria, and reviewing automated tests
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines, automated deployment practices, and modern DevOps principles
• Experience with version control systems (ex. Git, GitHub)
• Experience delivering end-to-end features including backend services, APIs, integrations, and operational tooling
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to evaluate tradeoffs and navigate complex technical challenges
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills with the ability to explain complex concepts to technical and non-technical audiences
• Proven ability to deliver results in fast-paced environments while balancing multiple priorities and ambiguity
• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, MIS, or related field; or 4 years of equivalent work experience and a high school diploma/GED

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience designing optimization, planning, scheduling, routing, allocation, or decision-support systems
• Experience building highly automated, high-volume workflows where human intervention is primarily exception-based
• Experience with rules engines, decision engines, workflow orchestration platforms, or configurable business process frameworks
• Experience designing systems that balance competing objectives such as cost, service, utilization, capacity, and operational constraints
• Experience modernizing complex legacy platforms through incremental migration and domain-driven architecture approaches
• Experience working with transportation, logistics, supply chain, planning, or operational technology platforms
• Experience developing configurable and metadata-driven platforms that support diverse customer requirements without requiring custom development
• Experience integrating optimization engines, planning services, AI models, or advanced analytics capabilities into production systems
• Experience building AI-enabled applications, agent-based workflows, intelligent automation solutions, or LLM-powered capabilities
• Experience applying AI technologies in enterprise environments with appropriate considerations for reliability, observability, governance, and security
• Demonstrated curiosity, continuous learning mindset, and willingness to experiment with emerging technologies while maintaining strong engineering discipline
• Strong customer focus with the ability to connect technical investments to measurable business outcomes
• Ability to influence technical direction and drive alignment across teams without direct authority
• A commitment to fostering an inclusive, collaborative, and growth-oriented engineering culture
• We will review applications for this role on an ongoing basis and encourage all interested candidates to apply at their earliest convenience.