Principal Software Engineer — Legacy Modernization (Remote)

Skylight; United States; Remote; USD 150,000 - 230,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical insurance

Dental insurance

Vision insurance

Disability insurance

Life and AD&D insurance

401(k) match 10%

PTO ~25 days + 11 holidays

Professional development allowances

Job summary

Skylight is seeking a Senior/Staff/Principal Software Engineer to modernize legacy Air Force systems. You will refactor and migrate aging applications to a DoD software factory, while guiding government partners through technical tradeoffs and ensuring uptime.

You will work in a fully remote setup, collaborating with government engineers and contractors. The role emphasizes secure, scalable web tech, test automation, and a strong user focus, with a clear pathway across seniority levels.

Qualifications

• Ability to write clean, working, and reusable code.
• Can produce high-quality code by adhering to good practices such as automated testing.
• Familiar with building secure, compliant software and defending against vulnerabilities.
• Foundational understanding of data engineering and datastores for persistent data.
• Understand systems and how to fit components with performance and reliability in mind.
• Always put users at the center, considering impact of code.
• Experience shipping production software in a modern web stack, including legacy migrations.
• Experience in government or regulated environments with security authorization (ATO).
• Experience working on cross-functional teams in iterative delivery.
• Proven ability to stay aligned on remote teams.

Responsibilities

• Refactor and migrate legacy web applications onto a DoD software factory with minimal downtime.
• Collaborate in a cross-functional team of researchers, designers, product managers, and engineers.
• Promote lean-agile practices: simple design, CI, version control, automated testing.
• Analyze systems to identify debt and instability, design and document solutions.
• Explain technical tradeoffs to non-technical stakeholders for multi-vendor decisions.
• Pair with government engineers to ensure modern practices stick after project ends.

Skills

Clean code

Automated testing

Secure software

Data engineering

System integration

User-centric design

Legacy modernization

Cross-functional teamwork

Remote collaboration

Public sector experience

Job description

Skylight is seeking a Senior/Staff/Principal Software Engineer to modernize legacy Air Force systems. You will refactor and migrate aging applications to a DoD software factory, while guiding government partners through technical tradeoffs and ensuring uptime.

You will work in a fully remote setup, collaborating with government engineers and contractors. The role emphasizes secure, scalable web tech, test automation, and a strong user focus, with a clear pathway across seniority levels.