At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead the design and evolution of our cloud platform while mentoring engineering teams.
- Company: Join AND Digital, a forward-thinking tech company dedicated to closing the digital skills gap.
- Benefits: Enjoy flexible working, training budgets, and fun team socials.
- Other info: Be part of a diverse team that values collaboration, curiosity, and continuous improvement.
- Why this job: Make a real impact on projects that enhance people's lives and drive innovation.
- Qualifications: Experience in platform engineering and cloud-native architecture is essential.
The predicted salary is between 63000 - 77000 £ per year.
Principal Platform Engineer - 12 Month FTC
Who We Are
AND Digital are a tech company focused on accelerating digital delivery and dedicated to closing the digital skills gap.
We've been helping organisations build better digital products and stronger digital teams since 2014.
We believe our work should always leave a legacy for the client.
We do this through close relationships with our offices (or 'Clubs') so that our partners are always prioritised by a regional team close to them.
This unique model has driven success for our clients and ourselves, evidenced by our remarkable organic growth since 2014.
Today we number more than 1,300 people with Clubs all over the UK and Europe with plans for global expansion in the next couple of years.
Join us - and help us fulfil our mission to close the world's digital skills gap.
The Role
The Principal Platform Engineer will provide technical leadership in shaping, evolving, and scaling our clients cloud platform.
The role will establish robust, reusable platform capabilities and self-service solutions that enable engineering teams to deliver software faster, more reliably, and with a consistently high developer experience.
The Principal Platform Engineer will operate across architecture, engineering, reliability, automation, and developer enablement, influencing technical strategy while remaining hands-on in the design and delivery of platform capabilities.
Key Responsibilities
- Define and evolve the technical strategy, architecture, and roadmap for a AWS cloud platform.
- Design and build scalable, secure, resilient, and reusable platform capabilities.
- Develop self-service tooling and services that abstract operational complexity and improve developer productivity.
- Drive automation across infrastructure, application delivery, operational processes, and platform management.
- Establish and promote platform standards, engineering patterns, and best practices across engineering teams.
- Improve the reliability, scalability, performance, observability, and operational efficiency of the platform.
- Identify opportunities to reduce engineering friction, eliminate repetitive work, and accelerate software delivery.
- Establish engineering principles and guardrails that enable teams to move quickly while maintaining appropriate levels of security, reliability, and governance.
- Lead technically complex platform initiatives from discovery and architectural design through implementation and operational adoption.
- Influence engineering teams and senior stakeholders on platform strategy, architectural decisions, and technology choices.
- Mentor and develop engineers, raising engineering capability and promoting strong platform engineering practices.
- Champion a culture of automation, ownership, continuous improvement, and operational excellence.
Experience and Technical Capability
We are particularly interested in candidates who can demonstrate significant experience in:
- Platform Engineering
- Designing and operating internal developer platforms at scale.
- Building reusable platform services, tooling, and self-service capabilities.
- Applying platform-as-a-product principles to improve developer experience.
- Establishing standards and paved-road approaches that enable engineering teams to work independently.
- Cloud-Native Architecture
- Designing highly available, scalable, and resilient cloud-native architectures.
- Strong understanding of cloud infrastructure, distributed systems, networking, identity, and security.
- Experience making architectural trade-offs across reliability, scalability, performance, cost, and developer experience.
- Infrastructure & Delivery Automation
- Infrastructure as Code and automated cloud provisioning.
- CI/CD and automated software delivery.
- Automation of operational processes and platform lifecycle management.
- Experience establishing repeatable, standardised engineering workflows.
- Reliability & Performance Engineering
- Designing platforms for resilience, fault tolerance, observability, and operational excellence.
- Applying SRE principles and practices to improve availability and reduce operational risk.
- Performance analysis, capacity planning, scalability engineering, and proactive reliability improvement.
- Establishing meaningful service-level objectives, monitoring, alerting, and operational practices.
- Technical Leadership
- Providing technical leadership across multiple engineering teams or a wider engineering organisation.
- Influencing architecture and technical direction without relying solely on organisational authority.
- Leading complex technical initiatives and driving decisions through ambiguity.
- Mentoring senior and developing engineers and creating a culture of knowledge sharing and technical excellence.
Why join AND Digital?
We have three values: wonder, share, and delight.
These values inform how we work with clients, and our culture: what it feels like to work for AND.
We believe collaboration, ambition, curiosity and fun can drive innovation by creating a better environment for problem-solving.
By joining AND, we'll provide
- Opportunities to work on projects with big clients and the chance to produce meaningful work that makes a difference to people's lives.
- A "Blended Working" model, meaning you will be able to work in a range of locations from; your home, in your clubhouse, on a client, as well as just a change of scenery.
- A dedicated career scrum team, designed to help you reach your career goals and develop the skills you need to be your best self.
- An annual budget for training and upskilling, including allocated days off so you don't have to study in your own free time.
- Monthly and quarterly team socials - on us - ranging from after work drinks, to driving experience days with your fellow club members.
- A safe environment for you to be yourself and challenge yourself.
- Equal Opportunities Statement
At AND Digital we embrace diversity and are committed to equal opportunities.
We are actively recruiting for a diverse and inclusive workforce so want to ensure we do everything we can to support your application.
We want you to feel safe and empowered to let us know if you require any adjustments to be made to your application or interview process so please speak to our recruitment team.
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Principal Platform Engineer (12 Month FTC) employer: AND Digital Limited
AND Digital Limited is an exceptional employer that fosters a dynamic and innovative work culture, perfect for those looking to make a significant impact in the AI and Data space. With a strong emphasis on employee growth and development, team members are encouraged to expand their skills while working on cutting-edge projects from the comfort of their homes, with the added benefit of occasional collaboration in vibrant Manchester. Join us to be part of a forward-thinking team that values creativity and excellence.
StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫
We think this is how you could land Principal Platform Engineer (12 Month FTC)
✨Get Involved in Open-Source Projects
Diving into open-source projects is a brilliant way to showcase your skills and connect with other developers in the community. Not only will you beef up your GitHub profile but you might also catch the eye of someone at AND Digital Limited who values hands-on experience over just theory.
✨Attend Local Tech Meetups
Tech meetups are gold mines for networking and discovering job opportunities, especially in the fast-paced world of software engineering. Check out local listings for events in your area and don’t shy away from introducing yourself. This could lead directly to a temporary position at AND Digital Limited!
✨Showcase Your Work Online
With temporary roles, it’s all about standing out in a short space of time. Create a portfolio website where you highlight your projects and skills. Talk about your code, and provide links to your GitHub repositories. This will not only demonstrate your abilities but will also make it easier for recruiters at AND Digital Limited to see what you bring to the table.
✨Leverage Temporary Job Boards
Don’t forget to check specialised job boards for temporary software development roles. Websites like We Work Remotely or Remote OK often list short-term gigs that can be a perfect fit. Apply directly through our website as well, making sure your application is sharp—temporary roles can move fast!
We think you need these skills to ace Principal Platform Engineer (12 Month FTC)
Some tips for your application 🫡
Show Off Your Tech Skills:Make sure your CV highlights your tech stack and any programming languages you’re proficient in. Include specifics about any frameworks or technologies you’ve worked with; they can make you stand out in the sea of applicants. It’s all about showing that you have the chops we need at AND Digital Limited!
Portfolio 2.0:Since you’re applying for a temporary gig, it’s super important to showcase a portfolio that highlights your best projects. Include links to GitHub or any personal projects that demonstrate what you can do in a real-world environment. This gives us a taste of your style and your problem-solving approach!
Keep It Brief and Relevant:With a temporary position, we want to see your ability to hit the ground running. Be concise in your CV and cover letter; stick to experiences that directly relate to the role. Highlight any previous temporary roles or freelance gigs that show your adaptability and quick learning!
Tailor Your Cover Letter:Don’t just send a generic cover letter. Personalise it for Principal Platform Engineer (12 Month FTC) at AND Digital Limited! Mention why this temporary role excites you and how you see yourself contributing in the short run. Show us what you've got and why you're the one for this quick turn-around!
How to prepare for a job interview at AND Digital Limited
✨Nail the Technical Skills
For a software engineering role, you'll likely face technical questions or coding tasks during your interview. Brush up on the relevant programming languages and frameworks that AND Digital Limited uses, and don’t forget to practice some coding challenges on platforms like LeetCode or HackerRank. Showing your coding prowess can really make you stand out!
✨Prepare for System Design Questions
Even for a temporary role, having a grasp of system design principles can be crucial. Be ready to discuss how you would architect a software solution, including discussing trade-offs, scalability, and performance considerations. Having examples from previous projects can really show off your analytical thinking.
✨Demonstrate Your Adaptability
Since this is a temporary role, you'll want to emphasise your ability to hit the ground running. Highlight experiences where you quickly adapted to new technologies or teams. Let’s make it clear to the interviewers at AND Digital Limited that you can learn on the job and deliver results in a short timeframe!
✨Show Off Your Portfolio
Make sure to have a portfolio or GitHub ready showcasing your projects. Having tangible evidence of what you've done—be it personal projects, contributions to open-source, or previous work—can convey how capable you are. Tailor this for what might interest AND Digital Limited, so it's relevant and sparks conversation during your interview.
