Principal Software Engineer - Java

ZipRecruiter; Manchester; Hybrid; GBP 85,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

An innovative firm is seeking a Lead Software Engineer to spearhead a transformative banking software project. This role offers the opportunity to architect and build scalable services and APIs in a hybrid environment, contributing to a modern, event-driven system. You'll collaborate with cross-functional teams, ensuring resilient deployment strategies while mentoring engineers to uphold high delivery standards. If you're passionate about cloud development and want to shape the future of digital banking, this is your chance to make a significant impact.

Benefits

Up to 15% employer pension contributions

Discretionary annual bonus

Share options and savings schemes

30 days of holiday plus bank holidays

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in Java development with a focus on scalable architecture.
• Strong leadership skills and experience in mentoring engineering teams.

Responsibilities

• Lead backend engineering efforts and design cloud-based services.
• Establish coding standards and drive CI/CD practices across the team.

Skills

Java

Spring Boot

RESTful APIs

Microservices

Cloud Architecture

Kubernetes

CI/CD

Mentorship

Tools

Kafka

Job description

Job Description

Position: Lead Software Engineer

Location: Manchester (Hybrid – 2 days per week in office)

Salary Range: £85,000 – £140,000

Our client is shaping the next chapter of digital banking with one of the biggest and most innovative banking software projects in Europe.

We’re looking for innovative minds to help lead the way. If you're a hands-on Java engineer with a passion for scalable architecture and modern cloud- development, this is your chance to work on something big.

You’ll take a key role in a strategic engineering team that’s focused on designing and delivering the bank’s future core platform — a modern, event-driven system powered by cloud infrastructure.

You will play a key role in this greenfield project by architecting/building performant services and APIs which support innovative financial products.

What You’ll Do

• Lead engineering efforts on backend services in Java, built for cloud deployment and aligned with modern software architecture principles.
• Design and maintain integration layers and orchestration services that connect Vault with various internal banking systems.
• Establish coding standards, enforce clean code practices, and drive team-wide adoption of CI/CD, automated testing, observability, and secure development.
• Build scalable, reusable APIs with reliability and performance at the core.
• Work closely with DevOps, SREs, and platform teams to ensure resilient deployment strategies using Kubernetes, containers, and public cloud tools.
• Provide technical mentorship and guidance to engineers, playing a central role in shaping our engineering culture.

What You’ll Bring

• Strong background in Java (8+ years) and Spring Boot.
• Proven track record designing distributed systems and microservices at scale.
• In-depth understanding of cloud-first architectures and domain-driven design.
• Experience building and securing RESTful APIs and working with messaging platforms like Kafka.
• Comfort working across the software lifecycle — from architecture and design to testing and production support.
• Demonstrated leadership in setting engineering direction, mentoring others, and maintaining high standards for delivery.

Perks and Benefits:

• Up to 15% employer pension contributions
• Discretionary annual bonus
• Share options and savings schemes
• 30 days of holiday plus bank holidays

If you're interested, please apply now!