Principal Digital Platform Engineer

Role Overview

A prominent consumer business in New Zealand is undergoing a significant digital transformation, transitioning from vendor-managed delivery to building robust, long-term in-house engineering capabilities. This critical position is part of a small but high-impact senior team responsible for a digital platform accessed by hundreds of thousands monthly.

This role calls for a principal engineer who is detail-oriented yet thinks holistically about systems, focusing on standards, patterns, operational rigor, and shared capabilities to elevate multiple teams concurrently. As a trusted technical leader, you will guide decision-making, mentor peers, and actively engage hands-on when necessary.

You'll have full accountability for maintaining the stability and progress of a mission-critical platform, while also defining what exemplary practices look like as the technology landscape transitions in-house. Strategically, this role aims to enhance consistency and unify capabilities across various digital products, going beyond simple maintenance to strengthening the foundation for accelerated, safer development.

Key Responsibilities

• Drive the technical vision and ongoing development of the platform stack, collaborating closely with product teams and engineering management.
• Lead design and technical decisions across a modern microservices ecosystem, prioritizing reliability, performance, and long-term maintainability.
• Develop and refine backend services primarily using Java and Spring Boot frameworks.
• Operate within an AWS cloud environment, applying cloud-native best practices and operational excellence.
• Define and promote engineering standards and reusable design patterns that gain genuine adoption beyond mere documentation.
• Coach senior engineers, elevate team capabilities, and maintain a calm, pragmatic approach during deliveries and incident responses.
• Manage a compact engineering team (currently 2 members with plans for expansion), providing leadership and development guidance.
• Participate in a 24/7 on-call rotation, focusing on platform stability improvements and reduction of recurring issues.

Candidate Profile and Requirements

• Extensive Java engineering experience, having developed and supported mission-critical systems.
• Proficient with Spring Boot in service-oriented architectures.
• Strong expertise in AWS cloud architecture, deployment methodologies, and production operations.
• Experience working with distributed systems in environments where reliability and performance are essential.
• Familiarity with modern development productivity tools, including AI-assisted tools like Claude, for rapid iteration and experimentation.
• Excellent communication skills capable of uniting teams and managing competing priorities.
• Ability to influence cross-functional teams without hierarchical authority.
• Pragmatic mindset that balances perfection with sensible trade-offs for safe delivery.
• Commitment to improving peers through coaching, code reviews, and enhancing delivery processes.

Additional Information

Applicants must be New Zealand citizens, residents, or hold valid work visas for New Zealand. Reference requests will be made at advanced stages; applicants should not include them in initial applications.

For further inquiries, contact Teresa Jordan at +64 27 376 4884 quoting Job ID: 18181.

Applications will be reviewed continuously upon submission.