Principal Software Engineer (Scala/Java) - Inspiration & Entertainment (all genders)

As a Principal Engineer in the Inspiration and Entertainment area, your role involves architecting and developing the services and systems that will power the end-to-end discovery and engagement focused journey, making a direct impact on over 50 million Zalando customers across 25 countries and counting. 

We are looking for a Principal Engineer with hands-on experience in Search domain and building ML backed systems to be part of the Inspiration and Entertainment mission to define, drive and develop capabilities for discovering engaging content. We are looking for an experienced technical leader to collaborate closely with engineers, applied scientists, and the wider Search, Browse, Personalization & Recommendations organization.

 WHERE YOUR EXPERTISE IS NEEDED

• Design, build, and maintain large-scale systems and services for generating and surfacing personalized content to customers that is tailored to their interest using technologies such as Scala, Elasticsearch, Nakadi, and Kubernetes..

• Ensure the implementation of a state-of-the-art software development methodology and cultivate best practices in software development. Operate a complex and advanced system landscape that meets the highest standards in terms of reliability, performance, and latency.

• Mentor junior to senior engineers and actively collaborate with other teams. Share knowledge and expertise within our talented engineering and science community. 

• Work closely with applied science and engineering leaders, product managers, designers and other business stakeholders to bring our state-of-the-art solutions to the customers and to discover and identify new opportunities.

• As part of our Principal Engineering Community, you collaborate with other senior individual contributors to set engineering standards, guide decision-making for the technology landscape at Zalando via our Tech Radar.

WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR

• Familiarity with JVM-based languages, particularly Scala, (Java and Kotlin included), microservices development, operating cloud infrastructure. 

• Expertise in design and development of resilient, scalable distributed systems in a cloud infrastructure, with a preference for proficiency in Kubernetes and AWS. 

• A strong background in entity discovery and retrieval systems (Search and Browse) is highly valued. This role requires a blend of system design and hands-on coding experience. 

• Hands-on experience in managing large-scale Elasticsearch deployments.

• Good communication skills and experience leading organization-wide collaborations. Ability and eagerness to understand the business context where the team operates and the customer problems being solved.

• Experience coaching and mentoring senior engineers, and working closely with applied scientists, senior machine learning engineers and data scientists.

• Strong advocacy for agile processes, operational excellence, and adherence to coding best practices, including clean code, readability, and test-driven development.

INCLUSIVE BY DESIGN
At Zalando, our vision is to be inclusive by design. And this vision starts with our hiring - we do not discriminate on the basis of gender identity, sexual orientation, personal expression, ethnicity, religious belief, or disability status. You are welcome to leave out your picture, age, or marital status from your application. We only assess candidates on their qualifications and merit. ​

We want to provide you with a great candidate experience. Feel free to inform us of any accommodations you may need, so we can best support you throughout the hiring process. 

do.BETTER - our diversity & inclusion strategy: 

https://corporate.zalando.com/en/our-impact/dobetter-our-diversity-and-inclusion-strategy
Our employee resource groups: https://corporate.zalando.com/en/our-impact/our-employee-resource-groups

 OUR OFFER
 

Zalando provides a range of benefits, here’s an overview of what you can expect. Ask your Talent Acquisition Partner to learn more about what we offer.

• Employee shares program

• 40% off fashion and beauty products sold and shipped by Zalando, 30% off Zalando Lounge, discounts from external partners

• 2 paid volunteering days a year

• Hybrid working model with 60% (or more) remote per week, actual practice is up to each team to best support their collaboration

• Work from abroad for up to 30 working days a year

• 27 days of vacation a year (for Zalando SE)

• Relocation assistance available (subject to prior agreement)

• Family services, including counseling and support

• Health and wellbeing options (including Gympass)

• Mental health support and coaching available

Learn all about Zalando and our values here: https://jobs.zalando.com/en/?gh_src=22377bdd1us

 ABOUT ZALANDO
 

Zalando is Europe’s leading online platform for fashion, connecting customers, brands and partners across 25 markets. We drive digital solutions for fashion, logistics, advertising and research, bringing head-to-toe fashion to more than 50 million active customers through diverse skill-sets, interests and languages our teams choose to use.