Principal AI-Native Software Engineer

This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Principal AI-Native Software Engineer based in United States.

This is a senior engineering opportunity for a builder who has fundamentally transformed their development workflow through AI. You will own complex product initiatives from business requirements through architecture, implementation, deployment, and ongoing improvement. The role combines deep backend expertise with AI-native development, allowing you to orchestrate multiple coding agents and automate substantial parts of the software lifecycle. You will work closely with Product and Design while making independent technical, architectural, security, and operational decisions. The environment values speed, ownership, engineering judgment, and exceptionally high standards for production quality. You will also help shape how AI-assisted engineering is practiced across the broader organization.

• Own major product initiatives end to end, translating business and product requirements into technical specifications, architecture, implementation plans, production software, and ongoing improvements.
• Partner closely with Product and Design to clarify requirements, identify dependencies and risks, evaluate tradeoffs, and ensure technical solutions address genuine customer and business needs.
• Operate as an AI-native engineer using Claude Code as a primary development and orchestration environment, coordinating multiple agents, worktrees, branches, and development sessions in parallel.
• Decompose complex engineering initiatives into well-defined workstreams that can be safely executed by AI agents while maintaining appropriate human oversight and architectural control.
• Develop reusable AI-assisted engineering workflows, including skills, commands, hooks, context files, agent instructions, feedback loops, and verification processes.
• Automate substantial portions of the product development lifecycle, including technical discovery, architecture, implementation, testing, security analysis, code review, pull-request creation, infrastructure provisioning, deployment, monitoring, documentation, and maintenance.
• Establish quality gates and verification practices that ensure AI-generated work is tested, secure, maintainable, observable, and production-ready rather than accepted without critical review.
• Review AI-generated code at a Principal or Staff engineering level, identifying unnecessary abstractions, excessive complexity, weak testing, security risks, oversized changes, and technically functional but poorly designed solutions.
• Design, build, and maintain reliable software across backend services, APIs, databases, cloud infrastructure, integrations, mobile applications, internal tooling, and other areas as required.
• Work across Ruby on Rails, TypeScript/Node.js, MongoDB, relational databases, AWS, GCP, and adjacent technologies, using AI to navigate unfamiliar systems and legacy codebases effectively.
• Deploy and operate production systems while diagnosing complex issues across application code, infrastructure, data systems, third-party services, and development tooling.
• Continue improving products after launch by incorporating customer feedback, usage data, defects, operational learnings, and evolving requirements.
• Develop methods for measuring the quality, effectiveness, cost, and speed of AI-native engineering workflows and continuously improve the development system.

Requirements

• 8+ years of professional software development experience with significant Staff, Principal, or equivalent engineering-level responsibility.
• Demonstrated ability to independently deliver complex production software while partnering effectively with Product and Design teams.
• Expert-level Claude Code experience is mandatory, including substantial hands-on product development beyond autocomplete, isolated code generation, or basic prompting.
• Proven experience coordinating multiple AI agents or development sessions, including agent context, skills, sub-agents, tool use, planning, verification, and orchestration.
• Strong production experience with TypeScript/Node.js and both dynamic-language and strongly typed ecosystems.
• Hands-on experience with MongoDB as well as relational databases such as PostgreSQL or MySQL.
• Experience deploying and operating production software in distributed, cloud-based environments using platforms such as AWS and GCP, including service-oriented or microservice architectures.
• Hands-on experience applying AI/ML in production, such as integrating LLMs into products, building retrieval or agentic systems, designing prompts and evaluations, or implementing model inference.
• Extensive experience developing APIs and integrating with third-party APIs.
• Strong knowledge of automated CI/CD pipelines and software testing strategies, including determining what, when, and how to test.
• Ability to translate business and product requirements into clear technical requirements, architecture, and implementation plans.
• Strong product judgment and the ability to understand user intent, identify edge cases, and recognize when an implementation does not satisfy the underlying requirement.
• Deep understanding of software architecture, design, security, reliability, scalability, and maintainability.
• Ability to critically evaluate AI-generated code and distinguish high-quality engineering from superficially functional output.
• Comfort working across unfamiliar programming languages, frameworks, legacy systems, frontend, backend, mobile, infrastructure, and internal tooling.
• Strong ownership, initiative, problem-solving ability, and bias toward building and delivering.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to explain technical requirements, constraints, implementation plans, and engineering decisions to both technical and business stakeholders.

Benefits

• Base salary range of $215,000–$250,000, with actual compensation determined by factors including skills, experience, location, budget, and internal equity.
• Potential eligibility for bonuses, equity, or other forms of compensation, where applicable.
• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance, with 80% of the cost covered, starting on day one.
• 401(k) plan with employer matching.
• 10 paid holidays, 20 vacation days, 5 sick days, and 3 floating holidays.
• Basic Life and Accidental Death & Dismemberment Insurance, with 100% of the cost covered.
• Short- and long-term disability coverage, with 100% of the cost covered.
• Paid family leave and Employee Assistance Program.
• Quarterly self-care stipends.
• Optional pre-tax healthcare spending accounts, including FSA and HSA options.
• Dependent Care FSA and commuter benefits.
• Optional supplemental life, AD&D, hospital indemnity, legal, accident, critical illness, pet, and personal liability insurance.
• Inclusive and accessible working environment with reasonable accommodations available throughout the recruiting and employment process.

We use an AI-powered matching process to ensure your application is reviewed quickly, objectively, and fairly against the role's core requirements. Our system identifies the top-fitting candidates, and this shortlist is then shared directly with the hiring company. The final decision and next steps (interviews, assessments) are managed by their internal team.

We appreciate your interest and wish you the best!

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