Quick Summary
Who Are We?
Xcelirate develops technologically advanced platforms, serving thousands of users every minute. We foster a workplace where top developers collaborate to strategically plan and execute, maintaining market dominance and achieving global expansion. Our decade of success is built on customer loyalty and a talented team.
What We Are Looking For:
We are seeking a Principal-level Engineer, a natural Tech Lead who deeply understands systems and maintains clarity under pressure. Your approach to people management is integrated into your engineering work, focusing on hiring, guiding, and unblocking with good judgment and minimal ceremony.
You thrive close to the code, driving projects forward with a strong sense of ownership. You view programming languages as tools, understanding their fundamental ideas and suitability for problems, rather than being dogmatic. You have experience with diverse systems, including legacy frameworks, and prioritize progress over novelty.
When engaging with a new codebase, you meticulously read and build a mental model, identifying core abstractions before making careful, impactful changes. You possess strong instincts for performance, understanding hot-path optimization, speculative execution, and lazy initialization. You know where latency truly hides and profile effectively.
Your system design is robust and load-bearing, avoiding unnecessary complexity. You design for long-term needs, not just immediate sprints. Once established, you will build and lead a team of curious, intuitive engineers who learn systems before improving them, tackling complex problems effectively.
Your passion lies in the work itself: well-reasoned commits, reliable systems, and the satisfaction of a refined codebase. We are interested in your personal projects and homelab endeavors.
If this description resonates with you, we encourage you to apply.
What You Will Be Doing:
- Manage personal and team time, aligning with company priorities.
- Own complex engineering problems end-to-end, from design to delivery.
- Ensure critical platform areas remain reliable, performant, and maintainable.
- Develop new features and enhance existing ones across platforms.
- Pragmatically refactor legacy and modern codebases, balancing health and delivery.
- Write unit, integration, and end-to-end tests for software reliability.
- Engage in all phases of the software lifecycle, from ideation to deployment.
- Participate in and lead deep technical discussions, driving sound decisions.
- Work hands-on across backend and frontend systems.
- Identify inefficiencies and streamline workflows.
- Collaborate with senior engineers, setting high standards.
- Take ownership of work, ensuring high-quality, maintainable solutions.
Requirements
What You Will Bring:
- 15+ years of hands-on experience building and maintaining complex web applications.
- Direct responsibility for the development and release of multiple major projects from inception to production.
- A portfolio demonstrating multiple projects with 2.5+ years of involvement.
- Clear technical communication skills, capable of defending design decisions to both technical and non-technical audiences.
- Expert PHP developer (12+ years), with experience in Symfony or equivalent frameworks.
- 10+ years of modern JavaScript experience, including React or Vue (Next/Nuxt is a plus).
- Expert knowledge in at least one additional programming language (Python is a plus).
- Full-stack architecture expertise: monoliths, services, and hybrids.
- Proficient in cloud deployment and scaling (AWS preferred).
- Expert Linux user, including daily containerized workflows with Docker.
- Expert in infrastructure automation: Terraform, Ansible.
- Strong ownership of CI/CD pipelines and release workflows.
- Experience in automated testing: unit, integration, E2E; TDD where appropriate.
- Expert knowledge of web security fundamentals: authentication, authorization, data protection, and secure coding.
- Fluency in both legacy and modern codebases, with an ability to drive incremental modernization.
- Strong independent technical ownership and accountability.
We encourage applications from candidates who believe they are a strong fit, even if they do not meet 100% of the listed requirements.
Benefits
How We Support Our Contractors:
- Annualized rate of €145,000 plus a retention bonus scheme, paid every 6 months.
- Top-notch workstation: MacBook or Dell, branded merchandise, and essential equipment for an optimal work environment.
- Global co-working access for dynamic and flexible work-life.
- Full flexibility in work location and hours to support work-life balance.
- Participation in exciting events, including team gatherings and cultural activities.