Principal Software Engineer

Overview

As a Principal Software Engineer at Hippo, you shape technical strategy across multiple squads and serve as a senior consultant guiding complex, user-centred software. You collaborate with stakeholders to design innovative, scalable solutions and streamline delivery pipelines. You oversee large, multi-team programs and communicate the technical vision to executives. You drive engineering excellence through coaching, recruitment, and thought leadership, contributing to Hippo’s mission to deliver impactful digital services.

Pay / Benefits

• Contributory Pension Scheme
• 25 Days Holiday + UK Public Holidays
• Perkbox discounts
• Private health cover
• Cycle-to-work scheme
• Season ticket loans

Responsibilities

• Provide strategic technical guidance across squads as a senior SME
• Partner with senior stakeholders to design and deliver complex solutions
• Oversee design and management of development and deployment pipelines
• Prioritize multi-team workloads aligning with operational priorities
• Articulate Hippo’s technical vision to executive stakeholders
• Drive relationships with key stakeholders to resolve systemic challenges
• Lead recruitment strategy and coach succession planning
• Champion Hippo’s Engineering Herd through thought leadership and events

Key requirements

• Mastery of multiple modern programming languages and extensive experience across diverse stacks (Python, Java, Node)
• Proven track record leading multiple delivery teams on enterprise-scale, technology-agnostic solutions
• Strategic coaching and guidance of senior engineers and leads
• Exceptional communication skills for both technical and executive audiences
• Deep knowledge of full lifecycle development for user-centred digital solutions at scale
• Advanced expertise in architectural strategies and roadmaps across complex environments
• Expertise in containerisation (Docker, Kubernetes) and microservices architectures
• Design of system integrations and large-scale application architectures
• Mastery of agile methodologies across large, distributed teams
• Enterprise-level experience with Infrastructure as Code and public cloud (AWS, Azure, GCP) and CI/CD tooling

• Strong communication and stakeholder management
• Mentoring and people leadership
• Strategic thinking and influence
• Python
• Java
• Node.js

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