You are an established leader in the technology community within Vio.com or outside. You are recognised for your deep knowledge in your core development specialisation. You have proven yourself as a go-to person for helping others with finding the most efficient solution for the problems they are working on.
You have recommended yourself as a mentor and have consistently helped other engineers step up and grow successfully. You have a strong track record in owning and delivering complex projects across tribes. You are comfortable leading chapter wide initiatives that improve Vio.com’s technology and environment.
You are a recognised expert in Vio.com and you have a lot of freedom on the ways you help the organisation. You are a trusted advisor to senior leadership on engineering strategy.
There are no recommended specialisations for this level as at this point of your career development you have to choose which skills you have to develop to be successful. Your professional growth manager (line manager) can be a great sparring partner for you when making your decision and development plan.
Every Principal Engineer has what it takes to be a Staff Engineer and meets the expectations for that level.
- Successful track record as a Staff Engineer in Vio.com or in another company
- A deep understanding and experience with at least two other development specialisations
- Demonstrated the ability to collaborate well across squads and tribes
- Consistently delivered high-quality work on projects across squads
- The ability to balance multiple goals across tech/product/strategy/other squads and concerns
- Ability to communicate effectively with non-technical folks and senior stakeholders
- Regularly stepped up and took leadership to drive projects, change or innovation to success
- Track record of advising various stakeholders on engineering strategy
- The ability to work with leadership during an emergency situation to identify and communicate impact and progress
- Been recognised by colleagues as a mentor and go-to person for knowledge and advice
- Been recognised for your technical mentorship
- Demonstrated ability and eagerness to support, advocate, and sponsor for others to step up to take leadership of a project or team
- Designed and developed systems that deliver business value for Vio.com
- A deep understanding of the product and services within your Tribe as well as high-level understanding of all products and services across Vio.com
- Have in-dept knowledge of Vio.com’s business and business metrics and how the different parts of our platform impact them
- Demonstrate expert knowledge of your core development specialisation
- Ensure code/design/architecture reviews happen in the engineering chapter and that work follows established best practices and standards
- Turn difficult problems and underspecified goals into achievable projects. Anticipate dependencies and needs of stakeholders (other teams, users, customers). Create plans and roadmaps as needed.
- Be accountable for design and architecture direction by providing feedback and mentoring other engineers within a tribe
- Work with chapter and tribe leaders to ensure engineering effort is focussed on the most impactful areas for the tribe
- Monitor technical performance of engineers in multiple squads or a tribe, and partner with engineering managers and leads on mentoring and growth
- Create and evolve chapter wide best practices to raise the bar for our engineering
- Act as a mentor of mentors (other engineers who are growing as mentors)
- Able to execute projects and initiatives across the engineering chapter
- Represent Vio.com at external meet-ups and events (at least 2 times a year)
- Create publicly-viewable internal and/or external artefacts intended for the benefit of others. Examples: participate on sites, write blog posts, contribute to open source, speak at meet-ups or conferences.
Continue reading: Senior Principal Engineer