Quick Summary
Principal Full-Stack Engineer (Contract)
About Xcelirate
Xcelirate develops technologically-advanced platforms accessed by thousands of users every minute. We foster a workplace where top developers collaborate to strategically plan and execute practices that maintain market dominance and achieve global expansion. Our success is built on a decade of customer support and our talented team.
The Ideal Principal Engineer
We are seeking a principal-level full-stack engineer with deep, hands-on experience who prefers staying close to the code rather than drifting into management. You approach work with a stoic mindset, prioritizing importance over urgency, and bringing clarity to complex projects.
You possess a solid, intuitive understanding of advanced concepts like hot-path optimization, speculative execution, and lazy initialization. We are keen to hear about your personal homelab experiments driven purely by curiosity.
Key Responsibilities
- Manage time effectively while adhering to company priorities.
- Own complex engineering problems end-to-end, from design and problem framing through delivery and iteration.
- Ensure critical platform areas remain reliable, performant, and maintainable.
- Build new features and enhance existing ones across platforms.
- Pragmatically refactor legacy and modern codebases, balancing long-term health with delivery needs.
- Write comprehensive tests (unit, integration, and end-to-end) to ensure software reliability.
- Be involved in every phase of the software lifecycle, from ideation to deployment.
- Participate in, and occasionally lead, deep technical discussions to drive sound decisions and trade-offs.
- Work hands-on across both backend and frontend systems.
- Identify inefficiencies and streamline workflows to reduce unnecessary work.
- Collaborate closely with senior engineers, raising the technical bar by example.
- Take ownership of work, ensuring high-quality, maintainable solutions.
Required Experience & Technical Expertise
- 15+ years of hands-on experience building and maintaining complex web applications.
- Clear technical communication skills, capable of explaining and defending design decisions to both engineers and non-engineers.
- Expert PHP developer (12+ years), experienced with Symfony or equivalent frameworks.
- 10+ years of modern JavaScript experience, including React or Vue (Next/Nuxt is a plus).
- Expert level knowledge in at least one additional programming language (Python is a plus).
- Full-stack architecture expertise covering monoliths, services, and hybrids.
- Power user experience in cloud deployment and scaling (AWS preferred).
- Expert Linux user, including daily containerized workflows with Docker.
- Expertise in infrastructure automation using Terraform and Ansible.
- Power user level ownership of CI/CD pipelines and release workflows.
- Experience in automated testing: unit, integration, E2E; TDD where appropriate.
- Expert level knowledge of web security fundamentals: authentication, authorization, data protection, and secure coding.
- Fluency in both legacy and modern codebases, with the ability to execute incremental modernization.
- Strong independent technical ownership and accountability.
Contractor Benefits & Compensation
- Competitive Rate: €85 per hour plus a retention bonus scheme paid every 6 months.
- Workstation: Provision of the latest MacBook and branded merchandise.
- Flexibility: Full flexibility in work location and hours.
- Global Access: Access to a global network of co-working spaces.
- Events: Participation in exciting events, team gatherings, and cultural activities throughout the year.