[Remote] Principal Software Engineer, Data Engineering

Note: The job is a remote job and is open to candidates in USA. Highspot is pioneering the category of sales productivity through innovative software solutions. They are seeking a Principal Data Engineer to define the technical vision for high-scale data products and lead a team in architecting a reliable data platform that supports customer-facing analytics and AI capabilities.ResponsibilitiesArchitect the data platform – drive the technical direction for a scalable, reliable data platform built on a medallion architecture that serves customer-facing analytics, reporting, and agentic AI from a unified foundationBuild and optimize ingestion pipelines – design robust CDC, real-time streaming (Kafka, Flink), and batch processing pipelines that transform complex, nested document-oriented operational data into clean analytical models at enterprise scaleTame schema complexity – build resilient ingestion and transformation layers that gracefully handle deeply nested, continuously evolving document schemas — deciding where to absorb complexity (ingestion, transformation, or query time) and making those tradeoffs explicit and sustainableServe AI and analytics consumption patterns – architect data products that support both traditional BI workloads (pre-aggregated dashboards, dimensional models for scorecards and reports) and emerging AI consumption patterns (low-latency retrieval, contextual assembly, freshness-sensitive agent queries)Own data quality, contracts, and observability – establish the data trust infrastructure that makes cross-team data consumption reliable: schema contracts with upstream producers, data quality monitoring, lineage tracking, freshness SLAs, and clear escalation paths when things breakDrive cost-aware architecture – own Snowflake warehouse optimization, compute governance, and cost-efficient pipeline design. Build the practices and visibility so the team makes principled cost/performance tradeoffs rather than discovering them on the invoiceBridge producers and consumers – collaborate across organizational boundaries to align upstream software engineering teams and downstream analytics and AI teams around unified data strategies, shared contracts, and engineering standardsLead and grow the team – technically lead and growth-coach a diverse crew of data engineers. Champion best practices across the full spectrum of data engineering disciplines, from low-level pipeline architecture to sophisticated data modeling and analytical query performanceSkills8+ years of professional software engineering experience, with significant time spent on distributed, data-intensive production systems – including substantial depth in data pipeline and platform architectureDemonstrated depth in building production data platforms that serve multiple consumption patterns – you've gone beyond traditional BI to support real-time product features, AI/ML workloads, or customer-facing analytics from the same data foundationDeep hands-on expertise with modern data technologies: Snowflake, Apache Kafka, Apache Flink, and CDC tooling (Debezium or similar)Experience developing and operating cloud data infrastructure at enterprise scale (AWS preferred), including infrastructure-as-code (Terraform) and CI/CD automationStrong programming skills in Python, Java, and SQL. You write production-grade code, not just scriptsA track record of designing performant data models that support fast, efficient querying for analytical and product-facing use casesStrong cross-functional communication skills - you work effectively with software engineers, data scientists, AI teams, and business stakeholders across organizational boundariesExperience mentoring engineers and building collaborative, high-performing teamsDeep experience with the impedance mismatch between document-oriented operational stores and analytical systems – you've dealt with nested, schema-evolving source data (MongoDB, DynamoDB, or similar) and have opinions on where flattening and transformation should liveHands-on experience with data quality and trust at scale – you've built or operated schema registries, data contracts, quality monitoring, or lineage systems in an environment where multiple teams depend on shared data productsTrack record of cost-conscious data architecture – you've optimized Snowflake (or comparable) warehouse spend, designed compute governance policies, or re-architected pipelines to materially reduce cost without sacrificing reliabilityStrong instinct for the bridge role: you're as comfortable pushing back on an upstream team's schema change as you are negotiating freshness SLAs with a downstream AI consumerBenefitsComprehensive medical, dental, vision, disability, and life benefitsHealth Savings Account (HSA) with employer contribution401(k) Matching with immediate vesting on employer matchFlexible PTO8 paid holidays and 5 paid days for Annual Holiday WeekQuarterly Recharge Fridays (paid days off for mental health recharge)18 weeks paid parental leaveAccess to Coaches and Therapists through Modern Health2 volunteer days per yearCommuting benefitsCompany OverviewHighspot is a sales enablement platform that helps companies worldwide improve the performance of their sales teams. It is a sub-organization of Seismic. It was founded in 2012, and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, USA, with a workforce of 501-1000 employees. Its website is https://www.highspot.com.Company H1B SponsorshipHighspot has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships, with 29 in 2025, 14 in 2024, 11 in 2023, 37 in 2022, 15 in 2021, 6 in 2020. Please note that this does not guarantee sponsorship for this specific role.