Principal java engineer
Role details
Job location
Tech stack
Job description
Role: Principal Java Engineer
Location: Manchester (onsite once every two weeks) Working pattern: Hybrid & flexible Salary: Competitive six-figure potential + bonus (DOE)
Salary- up to- £85,000
Are you an experienced Java Engineer looking to shape technical direction, influence best practice, and lead by example?
This is an opportunity to join a modern, industry-leading software organisation building tech-for-good products used at scale. The business embraces a fail-fast, continuously improving culture and places engineering excellence at the heart of everything it does.
As a Principal Java Engineer, you'll play a key role in defining architecture, raising engineering standards, and supporting the growth of high-performing Agile teams while remaining hands-on with code.
The Opportunity
You will be a senior technical leader within one or more Scrum teams, helping to design and deliver the next generation of a market-leading platform. You'll work closely with engineers, product leaders, and stakeholders to ensure solutions are scalable, secure, and future-proof.
This role suits someone who enjoys technical ownership, mentoring others, and influencing engineering decisions across teams -not just delivering tickets.
About You
- A highly experienced Java Engineer with a strong track record of delivering complex, high-quality software
- Comfortable challenging existing approaches and driving technical improvements
- Passionate about clean code, modern engineering practices, and developing others
- A collaborative communicator who enjoys working across disciplines
- Naturally curious, proactive, and motivated by solving meaningful problems at scale
The Role
- Provide technical leadership within Agile Scrum teams, influencing architecture and design decisions
- Remain hands-on, contributing high-quality production code from day one
- Champion best-practice development approaches including TDD, CI/CD, and automation
- Act as a mentor and coach to senior and mid-level engineers
- Help shape engineering standards, ways of working, and long-term technical strategy
- Collaborate closely with Product, DevOps, and Architecture to drive successful delivery
Technical Environment
- Expert-level Java development experience
- Strong experience with Spring / Spring Boot
- Deep understanding of CI/CD pipelines, automated builds, and DevOps practices
- Strong advocate of Agile delivery with the ability to drive teams forward
- Solid experience with TDD, clean architecture, and scalable system design
- Experience with AWS, Kubernetes, NoSQL, or cloud-native architectures is highly desirable
Why Apply?
- Principal-level influence without losing hands-on engineering
- Modern tech stack and engineering-led culture
- Real impact through meaningful, customer-focused software
- Flexible working and a collaborative, high-trust environment
Burns Sheehan Ltd will consider applications based only on skills and ability and will not discriminate on any grounds.
Requirements
- A highly experienced Java Engineer with a strong track record of delivering complex, high-quality software
- Comfortable challenging existing approaches and driving technical improvements
- Passionate about clean code, modern engineering practices, and developing others
- A collaborative communicator who enjoys working across disciplines
- Naturally curious, proactive, and motivated by solving meaningful problems at scale, * Expert-level Java development experience
- Strong experience with Spring / Spring Boot
- Deep understanding of CI/CD pipelines, automated builds, and DevOps practices
- Strong advocate of Agile delivery with the ability to drive teams forward
- Solid experience with TDD, clean architecture, and scalable system design
- Experience with AWS, Kubernetes, NoSQL, or cloud-native architectures is highly desirable
Benefits & conditions
benefits and bonus
