Principal Engineer

At NFI, we offer innovative, integrated, and customized solutions that span the entire supply chain. Whatever our customers’ challenges are, we have the knowledge, technology, scale, and commitment to help them solve it. It’s simply what we do.

The Principal Developer reports to the Manager, Development Services and provides technical leadership for custom applications and responsible AI solutions s individual contributor leads the design and implementation of complex solutions that improve operational efficiency and customer value, providing expert guidance on architecture, integrations, data design, and technology decisions across applications and business functions.

The role combines active coding and production ownership with technical direction for assigned initiatives. The Principal Developer turns ambiguous needs into achievable milestones, anticipates risks, and mentors developers through complex challenges.

• Design, develop, test, deploy, and support complex enterprise applications, integrations, and AI solutions; take technical ownership of assigned initiatives throughout their lifecycle.
• Translate business needs into solution designs, implementation plans, estimates, acceptance criteria, and measurable milestones; clarify dependencies and communicate changes to delivery expectations early.
• Lead technical decisions for assigned projects, evaluating options against business value, security, reliability, scalability, maintainability, and total cost of ownership.
• Provide expert advice on problems that span applications or organizational boundaries; collaborate with architecture, security, infrastructure, data, and business teams to deliver integrated solutions.
• Write and review production code, establish reusable patterns, and guide implementation across backend services, user interfaces, APIs, and data access layers.
• Apply and help improve team standards for Git workflows, peer review, automated testing, CI/CD, documentation, and shared code ownership in partnership with the manager.
• Design database structures and integration contracts that protect data integrity; diagnose and resolve application and query performance issues.
• Identify technical debt, dependencies, and emerging risks before they disrupt delivery; recommend practical remediation and modernization plans aligned with agreed priorities.
• Build and evaluate AI-enabled applications and agents using approved platforms; advise on architecture, grounding, integrations, platform selection, and operational cost.
• Implement responsible AI controls, including appropriate data access, output evaluation, human oversight, logging, and monitoring, in alignment with enterprise policies and governance.
• Prepare solutions for production with automated tests, monitoring, deployment and rollback procedures, and support documentation; resolve complex incidents and prevent recurrence through root cause analysis.
• Mentor developers through design discussions, code reviews, pairing, and knowledge sharing; provide constructive feedback that improves technical judgment and independent problem solving.
• Coordinate technical work and dependencies within assigned initiatives; recommend task allocation and resource adjustments with the manager and relevant project stakeholders.
• Use delivery, quality, reliability, and usage measures to evaluate results, detect trends, and recommend improvements that produce measurable business outcomes.
• Research tools and emerging technologies, develop business cases, and lead focused pilots; share findings and recommend adoption based on evidence.
• Lead agreed process and technology improvements across affected teams, build support for proposed changes, and use feedback to assess progress and refine implementation.
• Communicate designs, risks, recommendations, and results clearly to technical and business audiences; seek specialist advice when needed and contribute to reviews beyond immediate assignments.
• Other duties as assigned.

• Functional Expertise: Applies deep technical knowledge to complex decisions and solutions that cross organizational boundaries. Connects technology choices to business value and develops sound cases for process and technology investment.
• Communication and
  
  Collaboration:
  
  Builds effective partnerships, shares information openly, and gains support for technical recommendations. Explains complex issues clearly, seeks relevant expertise, and provides useful feedback beyond…