Principal Software Engineer, Payer Portal

athenahealth; Boston (MA); Hybrid; USD 164,000 - 280,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Commuter support

Employee assistance programs

Tuition assistance

Employee resource groups

Collaborative workspaces

Job summary

athenahealth is seeking a Principal Software Engineer for its athenaCollector backend in Boston. You’ll lead design, delivery, and reliability of revenue cycle software within a hybrid work model, partnering across product, architecture, and engineering teams.

You will mentor engineers, drive architectural decisions, and help shape standards while exploring AI-assisted development to improve delivery. This role emphasizes scale, quality, and collaboration across a complex platform.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent practical experience in CS/Engineering.
• 12+ years engineering experience with progression to technical leadership.
• Deep backend experience in distributed systems and enterprise software.
• Strong Java and Spring Boot backend development background.
• Proven track record in architectural decision-making and design.

Responsibilities

• Lead design, development, and delivery of backend software within an agile, cross-functional team.
• Address complex system challenges across monoliths and new platform services, ensuring reliability and observability.
• Set engineering standards, code review practices, and test-driven development approaches.
• Collaborate with product and engineering to surface risks and support timely decisions.
• Mentor engineers and grow senior contributors to higher impact roles.
• Integrate AI coding assistants and define shared norms for responsible use in design, coding, testing, and review.
• Communicate complex tech concepts to technical and non-technical audiences, and support hiring and onboarding.

Skills

Distributed systems

Backend leadership

Java

Spring Boot

AWS

Kubernetes

Terraform

PostgreSQL

Oracle

React

AI coding assistants

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science / Engineering or related field

12+ years of engineering experience in product development

Tools

GitHub Copilot

Claude Code

Codex

Cursor

Job description

Join us as we work to create a thriving ecosystem that delivers accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all.

The Principal Software Engineer leads the design and delivery of backend software for athenahealth’s Collector product. Based in Boston, MA with a hybrid work arrangement, this role partners with product, architecture, and engineering teams to solve complex revenue cycle challenges using distributed systems, Java, Spring Boot, AWS, Kubernetes, and related technologies.

Team Summary

athenaCollector is a critical part of the athenaOne platform, helping medical provider organizations manage revenue cycle operations with accuracy, scale, and reliability. The product supports essential workflows across claims submission, claims follow-up, payment processing & posting, billing, payer connectivity, and exception handling, all of which contribute to improved financial performance and stronger operational visibility. The team works on a complex environment that includes both a large enterprise monolith and newer platform components, requiring thoughtful technical decisions, careful integration, and a balance between near-term delivery and long-term maintainability. By improving automation and streamlining revenue cycle processes, athenaCollector helps healthcare organizations spend more time focused on patient care and less time managing manual administrative work.

Essential Job Responsibilities

• Lead the design, development, and delivery of high-quality software within an agile, cross-functional team, owning technical decisions and guiding implementation in alignment with architectural standards and business goals.
• Solve complex system challenges across both an existing enterprise monolith and newer platform services in parallel, while driving production readiness through sound practices for testing, reliability, observability, and operational readiness.
• Establish and improve engineering standards across teams, including code review practices and spec-driven and test-driven development approaches.
• Partner with product and engineering stakeholders to surface risks early, clarify tradeoffs, and support timely decision-making.
• Mentor engineers and help grow senior engineers into more independent, higher-impact contributors.
• Integrate AI coding assistants and agentic development tools into everyday workflows, evaluate their fit for the team, and help establish shared norms for effective and responsible use in design, coding, testing, and review.

Additional Job Responsibilities

• Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Support collaboration between product and engineering by creating clarity around scope, dependencies, and delivery risks.
• Contribute to planning, estimation, and prioritization discussions as needed.
• Participate in design reviews, retrospectives, and continuous improvement activities.
• Support hiring, interviewing, and onboarding efforts when needed.
• Share technical knowledge through mentorship, documentation, and team learning sessions.
• Help strengthen delivery practices in Agile environments, including adapting workflows to support AI-assisted engineering.

Expected Education & Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 12+ years of engineering experience in a product engineering organization, with demonstrated progression into technical leadership.
• Deep backend experience in distributed systems, with a track record of designing and shipping production-grade enterprise software.
• Strong experience with Java and Spring Boot in backend development.
• Proven experience making and defending system-level architectural decisions, not only implementing within an existing design.
• Hands-on production experience with AI coding assistants or agentic development tools such as Claude Code, Codex, GitHub Copilot, or Cursor, including experience helping teams adopt shared usage norms.
• Experience defining engineering standards, code review practices, spec-driven development, test-driven development, and testing strategy across multiple teams.
• Experience working with PostgreSQL, Oracle, AWS services, Kubernetes, and Terraform; React experience is strongly preferred.
• Ability to work effectively across a complex enterprise monolith and a newer technology platform in parallel.
• Healthcare domain experience, especially in revenue cycle management (RCM), claims processing, or billing, is a plus.
• Experience improving Agile delivery environments, ideally with exposure to adapting team processes for AI-assisted delivery.

Expected Compensation

$164,000 - $280,000

The base salary range shown reflects the full range for this role from minimum to maximum. At athenahealth, base pay depends on multiple factors, including job-related experience, relevant knowledge and skills, how your qualifications compare to others in similar roles, and geographical market rates. Base pay is only one part of our competitive Total Rewards package - depending on role eligibility, we offer both short-term and long-term incentives by way of an annual discretionary bonus plan, variable compensation plan, and equity plans.

About Athenahealth

Our vision: In an industry that becomes more complex by the day, we stand for simplicity. We offer IT solutions and expert services that eliminate the daily hurdles preventing healthcare providers from focusing entirely on their patients - powered by our vision to create a thriving ecosystem that delivers accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all.

Our company culture: Our talented employees - or athenistas, as we call ourselves - spark the innovation and passion needed to accomplish our vision. We are a diverse group of dreamers and do-ers with unique knowledge, expertise, backgrounds, and perspectives. We unite as mission-driven problem-solvers with a deep desire to achieve our vision and make our time here count. Our award-winning culture is built around shared values of inclusiveness, accountability, and support.

Our DEI commitment: Our vision of accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all requires addressing the inequities that stand in the way. That's one reason we prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion in every aspect of our business, from attracting and sustaining a diverse workforce to maintaining an inclusive environment for athenistas, our partners, customers and the communities where we work and serve.

What We Can Do For You

Along with health and financial benefits, athenistas enjoy perks specific to each location, including commuter support, employee assistance programs, tuition assistance, employee resource groups, and collaborative workspaces - some offices even welcome dogs.

We also encourage a better work-life balance for athenistas with our flexibility. While we know in-office collaboration is critical to our vision, we recognize that not all work needs to be done within an office environment, full-time. With consistent communication and digital collaboration tools, athenahealth enables employees to find a balance that feels fulfilling and productive for each individual situation.

In addition to our traditional benefits and perks, we sponsor events throughout the year, including book clubs, external speakers, and hackathons. We provide athenistas with a company culture based on learning, the support of an engaged team, and an inclusive environment where all employees are valued.

Learn more about our culture and benefits here: athenahealth.com/careers

https://www.athenahealth.com/careers/equal-opportunity