At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead software architecture and development while mentoring teams in a hands-on role.
- Company: Join a growing tech consultancy with a focus on innovation and collaboration.
- Benefits: Competitive salary up to £80k, remote work, and travel expenses covered.
- Other info: Opportunity for career growth and influence in engineering standards.
- Why this job: Make a real impact in a dynamic environment with cutting-edge technologies.
- Qualifications: 10+ years of experience in software engineering, particularly with Java and cloud technologies.
The predicted salary is between 72000 - 88000 £ per year.
Salary to £80k, possibly higher for their Unicorn candidate. Role can be based remotely, as long as you can occasionally travel to London for client work (travel expenses paid) - approximately once a month.
NB: Please only apply if you are a UK National, have resided in the UK for the past 5 years and are prepared to go through UK SC Security Clearance. Proof of ID will be required prior to interview.
This role is with a growing technology consultancy. This is a hands-on principal engineering role: architecture ownership across multiple services, technical leadership across teams, and direct contribution to engineering standards and hiring. The successful candidate will be writing code as well as setting direction - this is not a purely architectural or management position.
Current delivery is a Java/Spring Boot microservices platform on AWS EKS, with a Next.js frontend and Camunda-based process orchestration.
Essential Experience:
- 10+ years minimum, principal or staff grade equivalent.
- Backend and cloud: Java 17 or 21, at expert level - modern language features.
- Spring Boot in depth: security, transaction management, async/reactive.
- Microservices architecture design - has designed services from scratch.
- Kubernetes and Docker in production (not local development use).
- AWS, hands-on: EKS, Lambda, S3, RDS, EventBridge.
- CI/CD pipeline ownership.
- Automated testing discipline: JUnit, Mockito, integration testing, TDD or BDD.
- Frontend: Held a lead or tech lead role on frontend development in React. Leadership must have been over React work itself.
- Understands and has implemented FFE/BFE separation - the split between the presentation layer and the frontend's own server-side tier.
Leadership:
- Architecture ownership across multiple systems.
- Cross-team technical leadership.
- Track record of influencing engineering standards, technology choices, or hiring.
- Evidence of growing other engineers.
Security clearance:
- UK SC clearance required. Active clearance strongly preferred; eligible candidates considered - must be a UK national with 5+ years continuous UK residency.
Desirable:
- Camunda 8 / BPMN process orchestration.
- Next.js specifically (App Router, server components, route handlers).
- Terraform or other infrastructure-as-code, to module-authoring level.
- React Native or equivalent building native mobile from a React codebase.
- Design system or component library ownership.
- Consultancy or client-facing delivery background.
- Open-source contributions, conference talks, or published technical writing.
- Polyglot beyond Java.
NB: for non-UK Citizens; we cannot accept applications from anyone requiring sponsorship (now or in the future) for UK permanent employment status. If you are utilising a work visa this must allow you to work in the UK unrestricted for at least the next 5 years.
Principal Software Engineer employer: Profile 29
This company is an excellent employer, offering a supportive and friendly work environment in the picturesque town of Sidmouth, Devon. With a strong focus on employee growth and development, they provide opportunities for team members to enhance their technical skills while delivering high-quality IT support to a diverse range of clients. The commitment to exceptional customer service and a collaborative culture makes this an ideal place for those seeking meaningful and rewarding employment.
