Principal AI-Native Software Engineer

Role Description

We are looking for an exceptional Principal or Staff-level engineer who has fundamentally changed how they build software because of AI. This is not a traditional software engineering role with an AI assistant bolted on. We want someone who uses AI agents, especially Claude Code, to independently take well-defined product initiatives from business requirements to secure, tested, production-ready software.

The ideal candidate is an excellent backend engineer first, grounded in our stack: TypeScript services, MongoDB and relational data, and cloud infrastructure across AWS and GCP. AI dramatically increases your output, but your engineering judgment is what makes that output valuable.

In this role, you will work closely with our Product and Design teams. You will operate with unusually broad engineering ownership:

• Clarify requirements with Product.
• Develop the technical specification.
• Work through implementation details with Design.
• Coordinate multiple coding agents.
• Review their work.
• Deploy the application.
• Manage its infrastructure.
• Continue improving the product after launch.

The ideal candidate is already working this way. You routinely operate several Claude Code sessions or agents in parallel. You know how to:

• Divide work across agents.
• Provide them with the right context.
• Establish effective feedback loops.
• Keep multiple workstreams moving without losing control of quality or architecture.

You believe manually writing code should become a relatively rare part of software development. But you are not impressed by code merely because an AI generated it. You recognize:

• Over-engineered "AI slop."
• Unnecessary abstractions.
• Sprawling diffs.
• Weak tests.
• Insecure implementations.
• Solutions that are technically functional but fundamentally poor.

Qualifications

• Significant experience operating at the Staff, Principal, or equivalent engineering level, with 8+ years of professional software development experience.
• A track record of independently delivering complex, production software in partnership with Product and Design teams.
• Expert-level experience with Claude Code. This is a mandatory requirement.
• Experience coordinating multiple AI agents or development sessions in parallel.
• Production experience with both a dynamic language ecosystem and a strongly-typed one.
• Experience with relational databases (PostgreSQL, MySQL) and document/NoSQL databases.
• Hands-on experience deploying and operating production software in a distributed, cloud-based environment.
• Hands-on experience applying AI/ML in production.
• Extensive experience developing and maintaining APIs and integrating with third-party APIs.
• Strong experience with automated CI/CD pipelines.
• Strong ability to translate business and product requirements into technical requirements and implementation plans.
• Strong product judgment.
• Strong understanding of software design, architecture, security, reliability, scalability, and maintainability.
• Ability to review AI-generated code critically.
• Comfort working across unfamiliar programming languages, frameworks, and legacy systems.
• Strong ownership, initiative, and bias toward building.
• Excellent written and verbal communication.

Requirements

• Use Claude Code as a primary development environment and orchestration layer.
• Run multiple agents, sub-agents, worktrees, branches, or development sessions in parallel.
• Decompose technical requirements into work that can be executed safely and effectively by different agents.
• Design reusable Claude Code skills, commands, hooks, context files, agent instructions, and development workflows.
• Provide agents with the technical requirements, architectural context, constraints, designs, examples, and verification methods necessary to produce high-quality work.
• Build feedback loops in which agents review, test, critique, and improve one another's output.
• Use agents to investigate unfamiliar systems, understand legacy code, create implementation plans, write code, generate tests, review changes, prepare pull requests, and assist with releases.
• Continuously improve the systems, instructions, and tooling that make your own AI-assisted development more reliable and scalable.

Benefits

• Comprehensive Medical, Dental and Vision plans (ButterflyMX covers 80% of the cost) starting day 1.
• 401(k) plan with a match.
• 10 paid holidays, 20 vacation days, 5 sick days, 3 floating holidays.
• Basic Life and Accidental Death and Dismemberment Insurance (ButterflyMX covers 100% of the cost).
• Short and Long Term Disability (ButterflyMX covers 100% of the cost).
• Paid Family Leave.
• Employee Assistance Program.
• Quarterly self-care stipends.
• Access to optional benefits including pre-tax flexible healthcare spending accounts (FSA and HSA), Dependent Care FSA, and Commuter Benefits.
• Optional Supplemental Life, AD&D, Hospital Indemnity, Legal, Accident, Critical Illness, Pet, and Personal Liability Insurance.
• And more!