Principal Software Engineer – Data Infrastructure

Role Overview

• Own the future of HubSpot’s data stores
• Shape the technical direction for the data platforms that underpin HubSpot’s products, with a focus on the data stores themselves and the systems around them.
• Drive architectural decisions across storage, access patterns, scaling models, tenancy, performance, and developer ergonomics.
• Help define what the next generation of HubSpot’s database platform should look like, not just how to operate the current one.
• Be a deeply hands-on, high-leverage builder
• Write production code regularly and lead complex initiatives from idea to rollout.
• Build internal frameworks, APIs, and platform capabilities that make HubSpot’s data stores easier to adopt, extend, and evolve.
• Turn ambiguous infrastructure problems into simple, scalable systems and clear technical direction.
• Lead platform architecture across multiple domains
• Work across big data, SQL/Vitess, batch, stream processing, and search to establish consistent platform patterns where they matter and domain-specific depth where they do not.
• Define reusable abstractions for data storage, ingestion, processing, and access that reduce fragmentation across the engineering organization.
• Push for simplicity, clarity, and extensibility in systems that can easily become overly bespoke or operationally heavy.
• Influence across the broader engineering org
• Partner with engineering and product leaders to align infrastructure direction with what HubSpot needs to build next.
• Work horizontally across teams to guide technical tradeoffs, unblock difficult decisions, and raise the architectural bar for platform work.
• Act as a multiplier through design reviews, technical mentoring, and principled decision-making on the most important systems in the space.

Requirements

• Deep experience building and evolving large-scale distributed systems, especially storage systems, data infrastructure, or foundational backend platforms.
• Strong architectural instincts with a bias toward simplicity, consistency, clear boundaries, and long-term platform leverage.
• A track record of owning and delivering complex, cross-team technical initiatives with product-line or company-level impact.
• Comfort working across multiple layers of the stack, from storage engines and data flows to APIs, internal frameworks, and developer experience.
• A hands-on mindset. You lead by building, debugging, reviewing, and shipping, not by staying removed from the systems you influence.
• The ability to move into unfamiliar technical territory quickly, form strong opinions grounded in first principles, and help teams make better long-term decisions.

Tech Stack

• Distributed Systems
• SQL