Principal Software Engineer

This is a hybrid position that requires a minimum of 3 days per week in our Raleigh NC office.

AKC is seeking a hands-on Principal Software Engineer to lead a small team supporting the applications used by our Sports & Events business. This is a player-coach role for someone who can manage people, write code, design practical solutions, estimate work, and lead projects through delivery.

You will partner closely with business analysts, Sports & Events stakeholders, QA, UX, PMO, and peer engineering leaders to support production systems, deliver enhancements, and improve the long-term health of the application portfolio. Success in this role requires strong technical judgment, clear communication, and the ability to balance delivery with ongoing L2 support in a small-team environment.

• This is a hybrid position requiring onsite work in our Raleigh, NC office.
• Core technical experience with Oracle SQL, Angular, and Node.js is required.

Why This Role Is Exciting

• Lead a small, high-impact team where your technical contribution and leadership both matter
• Own a meaningful portfolio of applications that support AKC’s Sports & Events operations
• Help shape improvements across modern and legacy systems while working closely with business and engineering partners

What You’ll Do

• Lead and develop the team: Manage, coach, and support a small team of developers and contractors while fostering accountability, collaboration, and technical growth.
• Own technical delivery: Lead the design, estimation, planning, and execution of small to mid-sized projects and enhancements, translating business requirements into practical solutions.
• Contribute hands-on: Write code, perform code reviews, troubleshoot issues, and help the team deliver high-quality solutions.
• Partner across the business: Work closely with Sports & Events stakeholders, business analysts, QA, UX, PMO, and peer engineering leaders to align priorities and deliver effectively.
• Support and improve production systems: Oversee ongoing support and maintenance of production applications, including L2 issue resolution, root cause analysis, prioritization of fixes, and opportunities to modernize or rewrite legacy systems over time.
• Drive engineering quality: Promote strong engineering practices in code quality, testing, documentation, estimation, and maintainable design.

What We’re Looking For

Leadership and Delivery

• 10+ years of software development experience, including leading projects and managing or mentoring technical team members
• Strong ability to estimate work, break down requirements, identify risks and dependencies, and guide a team through execution
• Experience with interviewing, hiring, coaching, performance feedback, and employee development
• Excellent communication skills and the ability to work effectively with business and technical partners

Technical Design and Architecture

• Strong understanding of software design, application architecture, and best practices for building scalable, maintainable systems
• Experience translating business processes into structured technical workflows and designing solutions for branching logic, exception handling, and coordinated system behavior
• Understanding of APIs, event-driven architectures, messaging systems, asynchronous processing, and orchestration patterns
• Experience evaluating workflow or orchestration platforms and supporting transformation initiatives is a plus

Technical Environment

• Strong hands-on experience with JavaScript, HTML, CSS, Angular, Node.js, and Oracle SQL
• Comfort working across modern and legacy application stacks, with the ability to learn unfamiliar technologies to troubleshoot and support existing systems
• Experience in a DevOps-oriented environment with shared ownership for delivery, deployment, and production support
• Python, MongoDB, Redis, Linux, Docker, FastAPI, NestJS, Elasticsearch, NGINX, Grafana, and InfluxDB are helpful

Who This Role Is For

• Engineers who enjoy leading from the front, not from the sidelines
• People comfortable working in a small, high-impact team
• Leaders who can balance delivery, support, and people management effectively

Who This Role Is Not For

This role is likely not a fit if:

• You are looking for a role focused primarily on people management rather than hands-on technical contribution
• You prefer clear separation between leadership responsibilities and day-to-day technical delivery
• You are looking for a pure greenfield or architecture-only role with minimal support responsibility
• You strongly prefer working only with modern technologies and are not interested in supporting or modernizing legacy systems