The Principal Engineer will lead complex engineering projects, influence technical strategy, mentor engineers, and ensure system architecture aligns with business needs, promoting a culture of excellence and innovation.
Our Purpose
At Xero, we’re here to help you supercharge your business. We do this by automating routine tasks, surfacing actionable insights and connecting businesses with the right data, advisors and apps. When that happens, we’re not only making life better for small business, we’ll be building a stronger economy that can change the world.
About the team
This Principal Engineer will join the Accounting Domain in Xero, which lies at the heart of what Xero does. You’ll work in collaboration with multiple engineering teams - some work within the domain and others work on delivering products that depend on it. The exposure this Principal Engineer will get to all aspects of what Xero does, through being part of this core domain, will be both challenging and interesting.
How you’ll make an impact
Own and deliver org/company-wide multi-year, multi-team goals with technical expertise of In-depth understanding of specific technologies and engineering principles relevant(e.g., software, hardware, systems).
Design and evaluate system architectures, ensuring scalability, reliability, and performance utilising your high-level programming skills in relevant languages, with a focus on best practices and design patterns.
This specific position will unlock and enable Platform Enablement teams to scale for 10x growth while uplifting tech stack through transition states that will drive business value.
What you'll bring to the role:
- Proven experience in tech leading large, complex projects to delivery, ensuring technical excellence and alignment with strategic goals.
- Extensive technical leadership experience on cloud-native platforms, with a strong focus on scalability, reliability, and performance.
- Strong communicator—able to develop compelling, clear, and focused messages and effectively present them at the executive level.
- Demonstrated ability to mentor and coach engineers (across all levels) on technical challenges and career development.
- Experience contributing to technical vision and advocating for engineering best practices across a portfolio.
- Skilled in developing and implementing techniques to quantify the cost of technical debt and determine when to address it.
What you’ll do:
- Influencing the technical strategy of a group, often partnering closely with Heads of Engineering and/or senior product and engineering leadership to ensure the health of product development as a whole and influences the overall direction of product development.
- Collaboration with product managers, designers, and other stakeholders to align technical solutions with business needs. Principal Engineer helps break down silos within and across functions and influences others to reach the best outcome for Xero. They build deep cross-functional relationships, facilitate the right conversations, and settle disagreements by managing different viewpoints.
- Principal Engineer lifts team performance through goal clarity, feedback, removal of barriers, coaching and establishing a psychologically safe inclusive team culture. They model a standard of excellence that supports a culture of high performance on their team. They drive engineering-wide processes and define the bar for quality and best practices. They devote time to spreading knowledge widely via talks, blog posts or written documentation.
- Proven experience in software engineering with a focus on system architecture and design.
- Champion a culture of experimentation, encouraging the team to test new ideas and technologies through prototypes and proof-of-concept projects.
Why Xero?
Offering very generous paid leave to use however you’d like (plus statutory holidays!), dedicated paid leave to care for your physical and mental wellbeing as well as an Employee Assistance Program to access mental health care for you and your family, free medical insurance, wellbeing and sports programmes, employee resource groups, 26 weeks of paid parental leave for primary caregivers, an Employee Share Plan, beautiful offices, flexible working, career development, and many other benefits that reflect our human value, you’ll do the best work of your life at Xero.
Top Skills
Cloud-Native Platforms
Hardware
Software
Systems
Similar Jobs at Xero
Cloud • Fintech • Information Technology • Machine Learning • Software
Lead Engineer responsible for providing technical leadership, writing code, shaping architecture, and driving CI/CD and security practices for cloud platform products.
Top Skills:
AtlantisAWSAzureBashC#Cloud CustodianCloudwatchGCPGitIamKmsKoraNew RelicOpaPythonTerraform
Cloud • Fintech • Information Technology • Machine Learning • Software
The Senior Engineer will enhance the AI/MCP platforms by designing workflows, providing support, mentoring, and creating documentation for engineers.
Top Skills:
.Net CorePython
Cloud • Fintech • Information Technology • Machine Learning • Software
Develop software for mobile products on Android, ensuring high-quality delivery and continuous improvements while mentoring team members and adhering to engineering standards.
Top Skills:
Agile MethodologiesAndroid StudioCi/CdKotlinMvvm
What you need to know about the Boston Tech Scene
Boston is a powerhouse for technology innovation thanks to world-class research universities like MIT and Harvard and a robust pipeline of venture capital investment. Host to the first telephone call and one of the first general-purpose computers ever put into use, Boston is now a hub for biotechnology, robotics and artificial intelligence — though it’s also home to several B2B software giants. So it’s no surprise that the city consistently ranks among the greatest startup ecosystems in the world.
Key Facts About Boston Tech
- Number of Tech Workers: 269,000; 9.4% of overall workforce (2024 CompTIA survey)
- Major Tech Employers: Thermo Fisher Scientific, Toast, Klaviyo, HubSpot, DraftKings
- Key Industries: Artificial intelligence, biotechnology, robotics, software, aerospace
- Funding Landscape: $15.7 billion in venture capital funding in 2024 (Pitchbook)
- Notable Investors: Summit Partners, Volition Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, MassVentures, Highland Capital Partners
- Research Centers and Universities: MIT, Harvard University, Boston College, Tufts University, Boston University, Northeastern University, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, National Bureau of Economic Research, Broad Institute, Lowell Center for Space Science & Technology, National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories
