Principal Java Engineer

Description

As Principal Java Engineer, you will provide technical leadership for GTI’s core SaaS platform. Reporting directly to the CTO, you will own the technical direction, architecture and engineering standards of the platform without direct line‑management responsibility. You will work closely with Product, Data, Operations, Dev Ops and QA teams to deliver secure, resilient and scalable solutions while mentoring engineers through technical leadership and best practice.

• Design, implement and review high‑quality Java and full‑stack solutions, APIs and integrations.
• Lead performance optimisation, scalability and resilience initiatives.
• Drive security best practices, vulnerability remediation and secure software development lifecycle (SDLC) practices.
• Work closely with Data, Operations, Dev Ops and QA teams to ensure architectural alignment and operational excellence.

• Translate business and product requirements into robust technical solutions.
• Support engineering teams in the successful delivery of roadmap commitments.
• Facilitate collaboration across teams to remove technical blockers and mitigate delivery risks.
• Mentor and guide developers to improve capability, quality and delivery outcomes.

• Conduct design and code reviews to ensure quality, maintainability and consistency.
• Author new development processes and continuously improve existing engineering practices.
• Promote secure, scalable and maintainable software design across all teams.
• Support and mentor team members to drive technical excellence and continuous improvement.

• Lead root cause analysis and resolution of complex production issues.
• Drive improvements in system observability, monitoring and operational performance.
• Ensure applications are designed and operated to meet reliability, availability and performance targets.
• Partner with Operations, Dev Ops and QA teams to maintain production stability and service quality.
• Embed a culture of operational excellence, continuous improvement and proactive issue prevention.

• Java 21 (LTS)
• Spring Framework 6 / Spring Boot 3.5
• Hibernate ORM 6.6+, JPA
• Apache Tomcat 11, IntelliJ IDEA
• AI Tooling (Claude, Codex, Git Lab Duo, etc.)
• REST APIs, OpenAPI, Microservices, Event‑driven architecture (RabbitMQ)
• Containers, Docker, AWS, Linux
• CI/CD with Git Lab Pipelines & Jenkins
• Observability: logging, metrics and monitoring
• MySQL, Apache Solr
• Front‑end UI (e.g. Angular)

• Strategic and systems‑thinking mindset
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills
• Ability to influence through technical leadership rather than line management
• Proactive, pragmatic and outcome‑focused
• Strong mentoring and collaborative working style
• High standards of engineering excellence and continuous improvement
• Trusted technical advisor
• Excellent attention to detail

• Degree in Computer Science (or equivalent experience)
• Extensive Java software engineering experience with significant experience in technical leadership
• Expert knowledge of Java, JVM performance and modern language features
• Deep experience with Spring Boot, Hibernate/JPA and enterprise application architecture
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, scalability, resilience and performance tuning
• Experience with cloud‑native applications, Docker, Kubernetes and CI/CD
• Strong knowledge of application security, OWASP principles and secure development practices
• Knowledge of a modern front‑end node‑based framework

• Permanent role – 37.5 hours per week. Monday to Friday 9am‑5:30pm.
• 3‑month probationary period.