Principal Software Engineer - Platform Services

We’re looking for a Principal Software Engineer to help shape the future of intelligent document management for thousands of law firms worldwide. You’ll build and scale the core capabilities that keep NetDocuments running—operating across global regions, managing petabytes of data, and driving innovation in our C#/.NET, Kafka, and AWS stack.

In this hands-on leadership role, you’ll spend roughly 50% coding, 20% on architecture and design, 20% mentoring, and 10% on cross-team strategy. You’ll define how we scale services, enable AI-driven content enrichment (including OCR and entity extraction), and deliver the performance and reliability legal professionals depend on 24/7.

You’ll shape the foundational services behind every NetDocuments product—search, document lifecycle, authentication, authorization, metadata management, DLP, and workspace management. As part of Platform Services, you’ll work across multiple teams focused on scale, security, and AI innovation—all within a FedRAMP Moderate and multi-region environment.

Reporting to the Senior Director of Software Engineering, this high-visibility role offers lasting architectural influence across the platform.

You will:

Technical Leadership & Strategy

• Define and execute the architectural vision for Platform Services with multi-year impact
• Establish and own patterns, standards, and uptime/performance targets adopted across engineering
• Drive initiatives that improve scalability, security, performance, and developer experience
• Influence organization-wide technical strategy and guide platform modernization
• Stay at the forefront of emerging technologies and apply them thoughtfully

Design and Architecture

• Design and evolve core services—search, document lifecycle, authentication, authorization, metadata management, DLP, and workspace management
• Scale Intelligent DMS capabilities globally with regional storage options
• Build content enrichment pipelines for billions of documents using OCR and entity extraction
• Make architectural decisions balancing performance, security, cost, and maintainability
• Define API design and versioning strategies with strong documentation

Ownership & Execution

• Take full ownership of initiatives from concept to production
• Solve complex challenges such as scaling enrichment pipelines and maintaining uptime globally
• Identify and reduce technical debt impacting multiple teams
• Contribute high-quality code for critical components, ensuring operational excellence

Collaboration & Mentorship

• Partner with Staff, Principal, and Distinguished Engineers to solve complex challenges
• Influence cross-functional strategy across R&D, Product, and Design
• Mentor engineers across all levels and lead knowledge-sharing initiatives
• Represent NetDocuments through technical writing, speaking, or open-source engagement

Continuous Learning & Innovation

• Research and validate emerging technologies through POCs and prototypes
• Shape tools and practices that evolve with business needs and engineering maturity

What Success Looks Like

Within 90 Days:

• Develop deep understanding of our systems and build strong cross-team relationships
• Lead your first major design initiative and establish technical credibility

Ongoing:

• Be recognized as the authority for Platform Services
• Deliver architectural improvements that measurably enhance performance, reliability, and productivity
• Mentor and elevate engineering excellence across teams

This role might not be a good fit if:

• You're looking for a purely advisory role; this position requires 50% hands-on coding
• You prefer staying in a single codebase rather than coordinating architecture across many services
• You're looking for purely greenfield work rather than evolving complex, production systems at scale
• You want to work independently rather than collaboratively (this role requires building consensus while having authority to make final technical decisions)
• You're uncomfortable working in a regulated industry with strict security and compliance requirements

What You’ll Need to be Successful

• Bachelor's degree or higher in Information Systems, Computer Science, or a related field or equivalent on-the-job experience
• 5+ years in technical leadership roles with demonstrated influence across multiple teams
• 10+ years of software engineering experience
• Proven track record of defining and delivering architecture for platform-level services at scale, with examples of systems you've designed that are still in production
• Required Knowledge:
  • C# / .NET (our primary language and framework)
  • Microservices architecture and distributed systems at scale
  • Cloud-native architecture on AWS (we use ECS, Kafka, and NoSQL databases like DynamoDB/DocumentDB)
  • Event-driven architecture and message streaming
  • API design, security best practices, and performance optimization
  • Observability and operational excellence (we use Datadog for logging, metrics, and telemetry)
  • Experience with B2B SaaS products in regulated industries
• Work Location
  • This is a hybrid role. If you're in the Lehi, Utah area, you'll work from our office 2 days per week. For remote candidates, expect periodic travel to Lehi approximately every 6-8 weeks for a week. We bring the team together annually for our company hackathon and regular collaboration sessions.

What Will Make You Stand Out

• Experience building multi-tenant SaaS platforms in regulated industries
• Deep expertise in C# / .NET ecosystem and event-driven architectures (Kafka)
• Track record of zero-downtime migrations and platform evolution at scale
• Legal industry expertise or experience with document management/content services platforms
• Strong observability practices (Datadog, distributed tracing, metrics-driven development)
• Experience with AI development tools and modern engineering workflows
• Conference speaking, technical writing, or open-source contributions

What You’ll Love About NetDocuments

• The People!
• 90% healthcare premiums company covered
• HSA company contribution
• 401K match at 4%
• Flexible PTO (typically 3 to 4 weeks a year)
• 10 paid holidays
• Monthly contributions for life activities & wellness
• Access to LinkedIn learning with monthly dedicated time to explore

Compensation Transparency

The compensation range for this position is: $200,000 - $250,000

The posted cash compensation for this position includes on target earnings. Some roles may qualify for overtime pay. Individual compensation packages are determined based on various factors specific to each candidate, such as career level, skills, experience, geographic location, qualifications, and other job-related considerations.