Principal Software Engineer- Eng

UKG is a leading Workforce Operating Platform that empowers organizations by providing insights and AI-driven solutions. The Principal Software Engineer- Eng role is responsible for defining the technical strategy for payroll processing platforms, guiding architecture across distributed systems, and integrating AI capabilities into payroll workflows.

Responsibilities:

• Define and evolve the architecture for large-scale, distributed payroll processing agents and supporting services
• Drive architectural decisions across backend services, data stores, APIs, and front-end integration points
• Ensure systems are designed for high availability, correctness, scalability, observability, and regulatory compliance
• Lead architecture and design reviews; set standards for system design, code quality, and operational readiness
• Design and optimize high-throughput payroll calculation engines and batch/near-real-time processing pipelines
• Build systems that handle complex payroll rules, country/state variations, and edge cases with deterministic accuracy
• Ensure strong transactional integrity, auditability, and traceability across payroll workflows
• Troubleshoot and resolve complex issues involving data consistency, performance bottlenecks, or distributed processing failures
• Partner with AI, data science, and applied ML teams to integrate AI-driven capabilities into payroll processing flows
• Translate AI and analytical requirements into scalable, production-grade software designs
• Enable intelligent automation, anomaly detection, forecasting, or recommendations without owning model creation
• Design systems that support explainability, monitoring, and safe rollout of AI-assisted features in regulated environments
• Design data models and persistence strategies across relational (Postgres, MySQL) and NoSQL (MongoDB) systems
• Ensure efficient schema evolution, data partitioning, and performance optimization at scale
• Build and evolve APIs and services that expose payroll and analytical data securely and reliably
• Collaborate with front-end teams to support Angular-based applications and workflows
• Mentor senior and mid-level engineers; guide design discussions and complex implementation efforts
• Influence technical direction across teams and initiatives beyond immediate ownership
• Partner with product, compliance, and security stakeholders to translate business needs into technical solutions
• Drive long-term technical vision while balancing delivery of near-term business value

Requirements:

• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience, including 3+ years operating at a senior, staff, or principal level
• Deep experience designing and building distributed systems using .NET Core and modern backend architectures
• Strong hands-on experience with PostgreSQL, MySQL, and MongoDB, including data modeling and performance tuning
• Experience building and supporting large-scale, business-critical processing systems
• Proven ability to lead architecture, influence technical decisions, and mentor engineers
• Strong problem-solving skills with the ability to break ambiguous problems into clear technical designs
• Experience collaborating with AI, ML, or data science teams to productionize analytical or intelligent capabilities
• Experience with payroll, HCM, financial, or other highly regulated enterprise systems
• Familiarity with AI concepts such as anomaly detection, rule augmentation, model inference pipelines, or decision-support systems
• Experience designing systems with strict requirements for compliance, auditability, and data privacy
• Front-end experience supporting or integrating with Angular applications
• Background in event-driven, batch, or hybrid processing architectures
• Track record of shaping long-term platform architecture across multiple teams or domains
• Experience modernizing legacy systems or leading large-scale technical transformations