Principal Software Engineer

Job Title: Principal Software Engineer

Location: Remote (U.S.)

Employment Type: Contract (W2 through Zip Staff - No C2C or 1099)

Zip Staff is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to lead design and delivery of scalable microservices for a leading healthcare analytics organization.

This is a hands-on technical leadership role. You will architect Java / Spring Boot services, optimize high-throughput SQL workloads, own Kafka event-streaming pipelines, and mentor a team of 4-8 engineers. Candidates who cannot lead delivery and contribute production code will not be a fit.

• Lead the design and delivery of scalable microservices using Java and Spring Boot
  , with clean separation of concerns and resilience.
• Design and optimize MS SQL schemas, stored procedures, and queries for high-throughput transactional workloads.
• Architect and maintain Kafka-based event-streaming pipelines for real-time processing and decoupled service communication.
• Collaborate with UX and product teams on responsive, accessible front-end interfaces integrated with back-end APIs.
• Conduct code reviews, define coding standards, and drive engineering best practices.
• Mentor and coach 4-8 engineers
  ; run 1:1s, support career growth, and remove technical blockers.
• Partner with product managers and architects to translate business requirements into technical roadmaps.
• Champion observability, security, and CI/CD across the platform.
• Screen candidates, run technical interviews, and help build the team.

• 10+ years of hands-on software engineering experience delivering production systems at scale.
• Deep expertise in Java (11+) and the Spring ecosystem (Spring Boot, Spring Cloud, Spring Security, Spring Data).
• Strong MS SQL skills - indexing, execution plans, normalization, and T-SQL.
• Proven experience building and operating Kafka pipelines in a distributed microservices environment.
• Solid front-end proficiency in at least one modern framework (
  React, Angular, or Vue
  ).
• Demonstrated leadership: led a team of engineers, owned delivery milestones, and influenced architecture.
• Comfortable in Agile / Scrum environments; experience facilitating sprint ceremonies.
• Strong communication skills with technical and non-technical stakeholders. Take Ownership, conflict/consensus, elevate solutions, bridge to business.
• Must be legally authorized to work in the United States without sponsorship now or in the future.

• Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, and cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP).
• Healthcare analytics, claims, or other regulated data-platform background.
• Proven hiring / interview experience on an engineering team.

Zip Staff partners with leading organizations to connect skilled technology professionals with high-impact contract opportunities. We focus on quality matches and long-term success.