Principal Engineer - Search

TL;DR

Principal Engineer (Search): Leading the design and optimization of search systems for a travel platform with an accent on relevance, scalability, and reliability. Focus on modernizing legacy systems, ensuring performance, and providing architectural leadership across multiple teams.

Location: Hybrid, Manchester. You’ll be in the office one day every two weeks.

Company

hirify.global is a UK's online package holiday specialists, with significant opportunities for growth.

What you will do

• Partner with the VP of Product Engineering to define the technical strategy and architectural direction.
• Lead the design and optimization of search systems.
• Oversee the evolution of existing systems, modernizing C# codebases and migrating services in Kotlin or Java.
• Champion engineering best practices across security, performance, testing, and continuous delivery.
• Provide architectural leadership across multiple teams, establishing standards and reusable patterns.
• Mentor and empower engineers to grow their technical and leadership capabilities.

Requirements

• Experienced in shaping technical direction and influencing engineering outcomes at scale.
• Skilled in designing and optimizing search technologies (e.g., Elasticsearch, Solr, OpenSearch).
• Proficient in Kotlin or Java, and comfortable modernizing C# legacy systems.
• Knowledgeable in distributed systems, cloud-native architectures (AWS preferred), and modern web technologies.
• Adept at leading teams through change and transformation.
• A clear and confident communicator.

Culture & Benefits

• 25 days holiday plus your birthday off.
• Generous discount on holidays.
• Access to Learnerbly learning platform, workshops, courses, and professional qualifications.
• Enhanced maternity, paternity, shared parental leave and adoption pay, plus other family friendly support.
• Regular wellbeing events and social events.