Principal Engineer

WHO WE ARE

We’re Hook—an award-winning creative content agency. With a collaborative, maker-centric team, and an emphasis on production-led design, we make ads, campaigns, and experiences that drive growth for the world’s most innovative brands.

Our mission is to integrate creative and production to help grow brands faster. But we believe what’s most important are the people who work with us and the experience they have along the way. We want clients to think of us as the best agency they’ve ever worked with, and we want everyone at Hook to feel like this is the best job they’ve had yet.

WHAT’S A PRINCIPAL ENGINEER AT HOOK?

You're happiest when someone on the creative team says "I don't know how we did this before." You build the tools that make that possible.
As one of Hook's principal pipeline engineers, you own the internal systems and tools that make our creative and production teams faster, smarter, and more capable, everything from web applications and workflow automation to plugins for the Adobe Creative Suite (UXP/CEP/Extendscript) and Figma. You hold yourself to a high bar across the entire development lifecycle: problem discovery, architecture, implementation, testing, deployment, and the long-term health of what you ship. You care about the craft of software as much as the outcome.
You're self-directed and comfortable owning complex products from the first idea through continued development, without needing a roadmap handed to you. You work at the intersection of engineering and creative practice, and you understand that a great tool in the right hands can change what's possible. When a client project needs a strong technical lead, you're ready to step in with that same ownership mindset.

WHAT YOU’LL DO

• Design, build, and maintain internal pipeline tools and systems that help Hook's creative, production, and operations teams work more efficiently including web applications, workflow automation, and API integrations
• Work closely and empathetically with Motion Designers, Art Directors, and Producers to deeply understand their workflows, gather requirements, and translate their creative challenges into technical solutions.
• Develop plugins and extensions for Adobe Creative Suite applications (After Effects, Photoshop, Illustrator) and Figma, primarily in TypeScript
• Own product areas end-to-end: problem discovery, UX consideration, technical design, implementation, testing, deployment, and ongoing improvement
• Identify workflow bottlenecks across departments and propose and execute technical solutions
• Recommend and evaluate new tools, frameworks, and approaches, especially in areas where Hook has evolving or emerging needs
• Serve as technical lead on select client projects (typically websites or small web applications), and occasionally manage freelance developers contributing to those engagements
• Codify your knowledge through documentation, best practices, and internal guides that help the broader team level up
• Participate in technical strategy as a craft leader, pushing Hook's capabilities forward

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

• Deep expertise in TypeScript and the Node.js ecosystem, this is your primary language and environment
• A demonstrated love of the whole development cycle: from proposal and planning through implementation, testing, optimization, and deployment
• Proven experience building and shipping production-grade applications end-to-end, with a strong sense of ownership and accountability throughout
• Experience developing plugins, extensions, or integrations for creative software — Adobe apps (After Effects, Photoshop, Illustrator), Figma, or similar tools
• Proficiency with Python, bash, and associated scripting and automation tools
• Experience developing, deploying and operating applications on Google Cloud Platform, AWS, Vercel, or equivalent cloud environments. Use of Docker containers for development is a plus, deploying them to production even more so.
• Working knowledge of relational databases or document-based databases
• Must have deep proficiency in the React ecosystem, including component architecture, state management, hooks, and optimization, to build robust, highly interactive, multiuser web applications.
• Comfortable with both frontend and backend engineering disciplines when developing applications. 
• A strong foundation in software engineering principles — you write secure, reliable, maintainable code and hold yourself to a high standard of craft
• The ability to work independently and make confident, well-reasoned architectural decisions without a lot of hand-holding
• Strong communication and collaboration skills — you must be adept at translating complex technical information, such as system architecture and design, to a developer, while also clearly and concisely explaining the same concepts to non-technical stakeholders, including creatives or producers. Furthermore, you should approach problem-solving with a collaborative, "customer mindset" when working with the internal team, ensuring that you are responsive to their needs and focused on achieving shared goals.
• An informed curiosity about AI and what it makes newly possible — not just as a coding aid, but as a creative and technical force you're actively exploring. You're excited about integrating AI capabilities into the products and pipelines you build. You stay curious about where the technology is heading and bring ideas to the table about how Hook can take advantage of it.
• You integrate AI-assisted development tools (e.g., Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot) into your workflow seamlessly. However, your high standard of architectural craft remains central: you maintain deep system understanding, produce robust, scalable, and well-designed systems, and leverage these tools as powerful extensions of your abilities, not replacements for essential expertise. You are the ultimate arbiter of system design and architecture, viewing the AI as a powerful collaborator under your expert direction.
• An intuitive understanding of how to work in a fast-paced, creatively-driven environment where production timelines are real and the work is always visible

WHAT ELSE

Qualified applicants will include a resume and a statement of interest that lets us learn a little more about you.

We are a remote first organization with a “work from wherever (within the US)” approach. We're a collaborative group of people who love the internet and want to create phenomenal work. Company benefits include health, dental, matching 401k, paid vacation and holidays, and more. 

At Hook we value what makes everyone different, we look for the best talent no matter the background. We know that great work requires diverse perspectives which is why we strive to create a place of belonging where everyone can express who they are. Come join us!

Hook believes in compensation transparency and equity. We’ve designed a 10-level advancement framework that’s applied consistently across disciplines and departments and aligns to location-based salary ranges. This role is leveled as a L6 or L7 depending on experience. During the interview process we’ll review your location, skills, experience, and other relevant factors to determine where you fall within our leveling framework and corresponding salary ranges. Please follow this link to learn more.

Please review our Transparent Compensation Philosophy. We are not currently considering candidates in the Tier 4 market band for this role at this time.