Principal Software Engineer - Query Engine, Database Internals - Elasticsearch

Elasticsearch B.V.; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 160,000 - 253,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Stock options

401k with employer match

Job summary

Elastic, the Search AI Company, is seeking a Principal Software Engineer to join the Elasticsearch - Analytical Engine team. You will define and drive the next generation of ES|QL capabilities, contribute to compute infrastructure, and provide technical vision for interfaces and language syntax.

You will collaborate across continents, mentor engineers, and help shape a strategic roadmap while writing scalable, high-quality Java code in a distributed environment.

Qualifications

• Experience leading technical projects in data and enterprise architecture.
• Experience mentoring expert engineers and guiding technical teams.
• Ability to define a long-term technical vision across multiple teams.
• Hands-on with search and analytics APIs such as Elasticsearch and related tools.
• Strong core Java skills and knowledge of data structures and concurrency.
• Autonomy in driving projects end-to-end in a distributed setup.
• Experience with data storage technologies and understanding of their operation.

Responsibilities

• Define, lead, and contribute to data-intensive feature enhancements.
• Research latest features and data structures to build capabilities for ES|QL.
• Collaborate with partners and product teams to translate needs into a roadmap.
• Apply analytics experience to shape ES|QL and compute engine architecture.
• Improve areas through collaboration and proactive design across teams.
• Contribute to user experience and API strategies around search and analytics.

Skills

Technical leadership

Mentoring

Long-term vision

Java

Data storage

AI experience

Autonomy

Distributed teams

Open source experience

Tools

Elasticsearch

Solr

PostgreSQL

MongoDB

Cassandra

Job description

Elastic, the Search AI Company, enables everyone to find the answers they need in real time, using all their data, at scale — unleashing the potential of businesses and people. The Elastic Search AI Platform, used by more than 50% of the Fortune 500, brings together the precision of search and the intelligence of AI to enable everyone to accelerate the results that matter. By taking advantage of all structured and unstructured data — securing and protecting private information more effectively — Elastic’s complete, cloud-based solutions for search, security, and observability help organizations deliver on the promise of AI.

What is The Role:

We're looking for a Principal Software Engineer to join the Elasticsearch - Analytical Engine team. This expert team of engineers is responsible for building new analytics capabilities in Elasticsearch’s completely new compute engine, and accessed via our new piped query language called ES|QL. This is a principal software engineering role that entails using your vast knowledge in this space in order to define, direct, and build the next generation of ES|QL capabilities. This role includes providing technical vision and direction for the customer/user interfaces and for the underlying language syntax and compute infrastructure. This role requires related past technical experience in addition to the ability to work cross-organization.

Our company is distributed by intention. We hire the best engineers we can find wherever they are, whoever they are. We collaborate across continents every day over email, GitHub, Zoom, and Slack. At our best, we write fast, scalable, and intuitive software. We believe that the best way to do that is to empower individual engineers, code review every change, decide big things by consensus, and strive for incremental improvements.

What You Will Be Doing:

As a full-time Elasticsearch contributor, you will define, lead, and contribute to the development of data-intensive enhancements. You’ll research the latest features, data structures, and algorithms in the industry to ensure we’re building the right capabilities for our users. You’ll work directly with our partners and product teams to understand their needs and build out a strategic vision for the longer term. You’ll bring your past experience in analytics systems to help build and drive an innovative roadmap for ES|QL and the compute engine. As an authority in several areas of Elasticsearch, everyone will turn to you when they have a question about that area. You'll improve those areas based on your questions and your instincts.

Our globally distributed team of expert engineers is focused on the search and query (ES|QL) analytics capabilities of Elasticsearch. This inclusive team collaborates closely with other user experience teams, crafting a friendly user interface, and with teams closer to the customer, building solutions on top of these APIs (Search, Security, Observability)

Finally, we write idiomatic modern Java -- Elasticsearch is 99.8% Java!

What You Bring:

• Experience leading technical projects in the data and enterprise architecture areas. You bring proven knowledge in building and running sophisticated technical infrastructures and engineering sound software systems.
• Experience mentoring expert engineers, providing technical and professional guidance.
• Experience defining a long-term technical vision for an area of a data-intensive application, working across teams and organizations to collaboratively build the technical roadmap.
• Hands-on experience with search and analytics APIs, some examples may include Splunk SPL, Elasticsearch, Datadog, Dynatrace, and New Relic.
• Strong skills in core Java and are conversant in the standard library of data structures and concurrency constructs, as well as newer features like lambdas. You have a strong desire to optimize and make use of the most efficient data structures and algorithms.
• Working with a high level of autonomy, able to tackle projects and guide them from beginning to end. This covers both technical design and working with other engineers to develop needed components.
• Experience with data storage technologies like Elasticsearch, Solr, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, or Cassandra, and an understanding of how they work and why they work that way.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills. Collaborating on the internet is hard. We try to be supportive, empathetic, and trusting in all of our interactions. And we expect that from everyone too.
• You have a proven track record of using AI to accelerate development, debug complex systems, and optimize code, while still owning the final outcomes.
• You possess the ability to collaborate across functions and teams and seamlessly transition between different projects, codebases, or teams based on business priorities
• You work autonomously and can drive decisions and results in a distributed team by leveraging asynchronous, direct, and transparent communication.

Bonus Points:

• You've built things with Elasticsearch before, and you have experience in the search and information retrieval space and understand the constructs and theory behind it.
• Experience working with open source projects and familiar with different styles of source control workflow and continuous integration.

Additional Information - We Take Care of Our People:

As a distributed company, diversity drives our identity. Whether you’re looking to launch a new career or grow an existing one, Elastic is the type of company where you can balance great work with great life. Your age is only a number. It doesn’t matter if you’re just out of college or your children are; we need you for what you can do.

We strive to have parity of benefits across regions, and while regulations differ from place to place, we believe taking care of our people is the right thing to do.

• Competitive pay based on the work you do here and not your previous salary
• Health coverage for you and your family in many locations
• Ability to craft your calendar with flexible locations and schedules for many roles
• Generous number of vacation days each year
• Increase your impact - We match up to $2000 (or local currency equivalent) for financial donations and service
• Up to 40 hours each year to use toward volunteer projects you love
• Embracing parenthood with a minimum of 16 weeks of parental leave

Security & Privacy Responsibilities: Take ownership of protecting the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of organizational data and systems by following applicable privacy and security policies, standards, and procedures. Ensure that all individual contributions follow Elastic’s Secure Software Development Framework (SSDF). Proactively participate in mandatory role-based training to ensure personal technical execution consistently aligns with the highest standards of data protection, data privacy, and system resilience.

Different people approach problems differently. We need that. Elastic is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to creating an inclusive culture that celebrates different perspectives, experiences, and backgrounds. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender perception or identity, national origin, age, marital status, protected veteran status, disability status, or any other basis protected by federal, state or local law, ordinance or regulation.

We welcome individuals with disabilities and strive to create an accessible and inclusive experience for all individuals. To request an accommodation during the application or the recruiting process, please email [e-mail]. We will reply to your request within 24 business hours of submission.

Applicants have rights under Federal Employment Laws and can view the following posters linked below:

Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Poster

Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA) Poster

Elasticsearch develops and distributes technology and information that is subject to U.S. and other countries’ export controls and licensing requirements for individuals who are located in or are nationals of the following sanctioned countries and regions: Belarus, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, or Russia, including the Ukrainian territories annexed by Russia (The Crimea region of Ukraine, The Donetsk People's Republic (DNR), The Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), Kherson or Zaporizhzhia). If you are located in or are a national of one of the listed countries or regions, an export license may be required as a condition of your employment in this role. Please note that national origin and/or nationality do not affect eligibility for employment with Elastic.

Please see here for our Privacy Statement.

Compensation for this role is in the form of base salary. This role does not have a variable compensation component.

The typical starting salary range for new hires in this role is listed below. In select locations (including Seattle WA, Los Angeles CA, the San Francisco Bay Area CA, and the New York City Metro Area), an alternate range may apply as specified below.

These ranges represent the lowest to highest salary we reasonably and in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. We may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range, and the ranges may be modified in the future.

An employee's position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to, relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, performance, and business or organizational needs.

Elastic believes that employees should have the opportunity to share in the value that we create together for our shareholders. Therefore, in addition to cash compensation, this role is currently eligible to participate in Elastic's stock program. Our total rewards package also includes a company-matched 401k with dollar-for-dollar matching up to 6% of eligible earnings, along with a range of other benefits offered with a holistic emphasis on employee well-being.

The typical starting salary range for this role is:

$159,800—$252,800 USD

The typical starting salary range for this role in the select locations listed above is:

$191,900—$303,500 USD