Principal Software Engineer

Principal Software Engineer

Location: Sydney/Melbourne - Hybrid

Reports to: Engineering Manager

Direct Reports: None

The Opportunity

Most Australians don't claim everything they're entitled to. This FinTech is changing that by building a platform that connects 13,000+ employers and close to half a million users to their salary packaging and benefits.

The engineering behind it needs to grow with the business's ambition. That's where you come in.

As Principal Engineer, you'll lead the next stage of platform modernisation. Setting the technical direction, solving hard cross-system problems, and helping senior engineers make better decisions. It's a hands-on IC role for someone who leads through credibility, not authority.

There's also a real opportunity to shape how the business adopts AI, from improving developer productivity with tools like GitHub Copilot, Cursor, and Claude Code, through to evaluating LLM integrations and building the governance frameworks to make it stick.

What You'll Do

• Lead complex technical initiatives across teams, platforms, and business domains
• Design scalable, maintainable architectures that support growth and resilience
• Partner with Product and business stakeholders to turn commercial requirements into robust solutions
• Mentor senior engineers and raise the bar on engineering standards
• Drive improvements to CI/CD, observability, reliability, and developer productivity
• Champion practical AI adoption, including LLM integrations, RAG architectures, and responsible AI frameworks
• Contribute to hiring and engineering culture

What You Bring

• 10+ years' engineering experience, including 3+ years in principal-level or senior technical IC roles
• Deep expertise in distributed systems, scalable architecture, and reliability engineering
• Strong hands-on capability in C#.NET, Java, or C++, and a modern JS framework (React, Next.js, or Angular)
• Cloud experience across Azure, AWS, or GCP
• Familiarity with SQL Server, Redis, Datadog, and LaunchDarkly
• Practical experience with AI-assisted dev tools (GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Claude)
• Exposure to LLM APIs (OpenAI, Azure OpenAI, Anthropic) and/or prompt engineering and RAG is a strong advantage

What's on Offer

• Rem package : Up to $210K base + bonus + super
• Hybrid working model: 2-3 days in office per week
• 3 bonus days at Christmas + birthday leave + 2 volunteer days
• Up to 20 weeks paid parental leave + $3K return bonus + super on unpaid leave
• Annual wellness allowance, massages, flu shots, private health discounts
• Salary packaging, share plan, career development, referral bonuses

Apply now or reach out for a confidential discussion.

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George Bates | LinkedIn