[Hiring] Principal Backend Engineer @SchemeServe Limited

Role Description

We're looking for an exceptional Principal Backend Engineer to help make backend engineering across SchemeServe better. You'll be one of the most technically experienced engineers in the organisation and the CTO's primary technical partner for backend engineering, helping shape our architecture, engineering principles and technical direction.

This is a deeply technical role. You'll need the depth to understand complex backend systems, architecture, security, performance, resilience and maintainability; review designs and implementations; spot risks; and challenge experienced engineers.

Success in this role comes through influence rather than authority. We want someone who understands there isn't always one "correct" way to build software.

• Shape our backend engineering strategy, architecture and technical direction.
• Help engineers make better technical and architectural decisions.
• Develop sensible engineering principles and guardrails without replacing good judgement with rules.
• Guide the continued evolution of our monolith and modern service-based platform.
• Coach and mentor engineers, developing their technical skills and judgement.
• Review significant designs and architectural decisions and challenge unnecessary complexity.
• Champion security, quality, testing, observability, resilience and performance.
• Identify technical risks and help teams navigate them.
• Evaluate technologies and patterns based on their value to SchemeServe rather than their popularity elsewhere.
• Balance long-term engineering quality with short-term business needs.
• Occasionally contribute directly to implementation when that's genuinely the best way to help.
• Be a generally awesome person.

Qualifications

• Deep expertise in modern backend engineering and strong commercial C#/.NET experience.
• Strong knowledge of software architecture, distributed systems and API design.
• Experience with mature legacy applications and modern service-oriented architectures.
• Strong cloud architecture experience, ideally Azure.
• Excellent understanding of databases, security, testing, maintainability and modern software delivery.
• Experience shaping engineering principles and practices across teams.
• A track record of making engineers around you better through mentoring, coaching and technical leadership.
• The ability to challenge experienced engineers constructively without becoming a gatekeeper.
• Strong opinions, loosely held – the confidence to challenge and the humility to change your mind.
• Excellent communication and the ability to influence without relying on authority.
• Excellent technical judgement, balancing quality, complexity, risk, cost and business value.

Requirements

• Experience modernising large monolithic applications.
• Commercial TypeScript backend experience.
• Cloudflare or edge technology experience.
• SaaS platforms at scale.
• Financial services, insurance or another regulated industry.
• Observability, platform engineering or SRE experience.
• AI-assisted development and engineering productivity tooling.

Benefits

• Fully remote UK-based role.
• Twice-yearly company retreats.
• Flexible working.
• Dedicated professional development support.
• Paid charity days.