Principal Software Engineer
- Military veterans preferred
2025-08-04 Leidos
Other
/yr
full-timepart-time
employee
contract
Vista California 92081 United States
Description
The Principal Software Engineer will serve as a senior member of the technical team, providing technical leadership and expertise while fostering collaboration and team consensus. This individual will play a key role in driving innovation, enhancing security compliance, and mentoring other engineers.
As part of a cross-functional team, the Principal Software Engineer will develop and maintain cargo inspection detection systems for the Ports and Borders group at Leidos. This role requires advanced technical expertise, a commitment to best practices, and a focus on delivering high-quality, secure software solutions.
Key Responsibilities:
Technical Leadership and Collaboration:
Contribute to the design, development, testing, and maintenance of services, simulators, and diagnostics (WPF and Blazor) using C#.
Provide technical leadership by guiding architectural decisions, fostering team collaboration, and ensuring alignment with best practices.
Lead the adoption of tools, including AI-based software development tools, to enhance productivity and innovation.
Promote team buy-in and shared ownership of technical solutions and processes.
Software Development and Security Compliance:
Develop software that adheres to industry security standards and enhances the security compliance of the codebase and coding practices.
Utilize object-oriented design principles, practices, and patterns to ensure the codebase is reusable and maintainable.
Apply Test-Driven Development (TDD) and Continuous Integration to ensure high-quality, continuously tested code.
Collaborate with Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Scientists to meet customer requirements.
Problem Solving and Innovation:
Evaluate customer problems, troubleshoot issues, and assist Field Service Engineers with problem resolution.
Drive innovation by researching and integrating best practices to develop cutting-edge solutions.
Communication and Reporting:
Communicate proactively and effectively within a small cross-functional development team environment.
Report project status and issues to management as required.
Required Skills:
Strong programming background with at least 8 years of production product development experience in C# and 12–15 years of overall programming experience.
Mastery of object-oriented design (OOD) principles and practices.
Proven experience in software architecture and leadership roles.
Expertise in Agile methodologies, including TDD and Continuous Integration.
Ability to create design documentation, requirements specifications, and other technical documentation.
Strong troubleshooting and bug-fixing skills.
Effective communication and collaboration skills in cross-functional team environments.
Desired Skills:
Proficiency with AI-based software development tools.
Experience developing software that complies with industry security standards.
Experience identifying code smells and utilizing refactoring techniques to reduce entropy in the codebase.
Proficiency with UML and documented design methodologies.
Experience with revision control (e.g., Git), multi-threading, TCP/IP networking, bus architectures, Web Services, Blazor, containers (e.g., Docker), Visual Studio, C++, SQL Server, and interfacing with real-time/embedded systems.
Knowledge of image processing techniques.
Education:
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and 12–15 years of relevant experience, or a Master’s degree and 10–13 years of relevant experience.
Location:
2985 Scott St., Vista, CA. Relocation assistance is not available for this position.
Travel:
Must be willing to travel abroad. If travel is necessary, typically it will be < 10%.
Come break things (in a good way). Then build them smarter.
We're the tech company everyone calls when things get weird. We don’t wear capes (they’re a safety hazard), but we do solve high-stakes problems with code, caffeine, and a healthy disregard for “how it’s always been done.”
Original Posting:
August 4, 2025
For U.S. Positions: While subject to change based on business needs, Leidos reasonably anticipates that this job requisition will remain open for at least 3 days with an anticipated close date of no earlier than 3 days after the original posting date as listed above.
Pay Range:
Pay Range $126,100.00 - $227,950.00
The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline only and not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job, education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as internal equity, alignment with market data, applicable bargaining agreement (if any), or other law.
