xero - Principal Engineer - Reporting & Insights
Requirements
• You’ve set technical strategy for a domain or portfolio over a 2 to 3 year horizon, and aligned multiple teams behind it. • You’ve led the evolution of a large, high-traffic, correctness-critical system across organisational boundaries. • You have depth in high-throughput, low-latency, resilient distributed systems and data-heavy architecture, and you still contribute hands-on where it matters. • You connect external shifts, AI above all, to product and architecture strategy, and you know where LLMs and agents belong in a system. • You grow leaders. You’ve mentored Lead and Senior Engineers into bigger roles, and your writing turns complex direction into decisions people act on. • Financial, reporting or analytics domain experience • LLM or agent-based features in production • A presence in the wider tech community through talks, writing or open source • We’re bold in our vision and pragmatic in execution, delivering useful improvements along the way rather than waiting for a large rewrite. We invest in AI to learn faster and focus effort on higher-value problems, while engineers stay accountable for what they ship. We use shared frameworks to avoid reinvention, leaving teams room to innovate. Engineers own their work, including quality, reliability, and on-call. Leaders set context and priorities, and engineers help shape the solutions. • We offer a hybrid model that blends the flexibility of working from home with the collaboration of the office, including designated boost days in our modern office spaces. This role is open to hybrid candidates in Vancouver, British Columbia, or San Mateo, California. We also welcome applications from candidates across Canada interested in relocating to Vancouver, and from remote candidates in Seattle, Washington. • OUR HIRING PROCESS • 2. Technical assessments: a coding assessment and a systems design assessment, run through an independent third-party provider and based on real-world scenarios. • 3. Technical deep dive (45–60 minutes): with a Principal Engineer and the hiring team. You'll walk through a past project you led, covering how you thought about it, executed it and led through its complexity. • 4. Values / Future Proof Xero (45 minutes): how you show up day to day, aligned with Xero's values and capabilities such as adaptability, ownership, customer thinking and AI fluency. • 5. LEADership (45–60 minutes): real examples of how you lead, influence and deliver in ambiguous, fast-changing environments, assessed against Xero's leadership principles
Responsibilities
• Set a multi-year technical strategy for Reporting & Insights • Delivered new foundations for the first major report families, setting Reporting & Insights up for its next phase of growth • Opened Reporting & Insights to bigger businesses, with performance that scales to our largest customers • Put shared foundations for AI-native reporting and insights into production • Grown the Lead and Senior Engineers around you and raised the technical bar across the group • Beyond year one, you’ll shape where Reporting & Insights goes next, and help steer Xero’s wider data and AI direction alongside the leadership team. • You’re the senior technical voice for Reporting & Insights. You own the multi-year technical strategy and target architecture, and you make the calls that cross team and domain boundaries. You shape the roadmap with the GM and Product, decide where we invest in foundational capabilities, and align teams across regions behind one direction. You stay hands-on where it counts: reference implementations, foundational frameworks and the hardest architecture problems • WHO YOU’LL WORK WITH • You’ll report to the GM of Engineering. You’ll partner with the engineering managers and teams across Reporting & Insights, who know these products and their data in depth. You’ll shape the product and AI roadmap with the Reporting & Insights Product leads. You’ll also work with Principal Engineers and platform teams across Xero, including the accounting core and data platform teams that own systems we depend on.
Benefits
• At Xero, we value the impact and skills you bring to the team. We don’t just hire for a role; we invest in people. We believe in a Total Package philosophy - which means your value isn't just a single number on a paycheque. While base salary is a core component, we look at your compensation through a holistic lens that includes equity, performance incentives, and world-class benefits. • The expected base salary range for this role in: • Washington, WA & San Mateo, CA: $287,000 - $320,000 USD • Individual pay is determined by various factors, including geography, level of experience, and the specific skills you bring to the role. • In addition to base pay, Xero’s roles are eligible for the following forms of variable compensation: • Variable Pay: Permanent employees are eligible to participate in our annual bonus and equity (RSU) programs. You may also be eligible for performance-based cash or equity (RSUs) incentives depending on your role level, and company performance. • Comprehensive Benefits: Medical, dental, vision, 401(k) match, and 21 days PTO, 10 days of Wellbeing leave, 5 days of Xtra Leave, 1 volunteer day, 12 paid holidays, paid parental leave. Further information included on our Xero Perks https://careers.xero.com/inside-xero/benefits-wellbeing/ page • Xero uses AI to help screen applications based on job-related qualifications. These tools assist our recruiters but do not make automated hiring decisions. A human recruiter reviews all candidates before any hiring action is taken.
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