Principal Data Platform Engineer
About the role
Principal Engineer – Data Platform
Location: Remote (UK-based; Security Clearance Required)
A UK Government Security Check (SC) clearance is required for this role. If you don’t currently hold SC clearance, we can support you in applying, provided you have lived and worked in the UK for a minimum of 5 years.
As a Principal Data Platform Engineer, you will define and drive the technical vision, architecture, and evolution of data platforms for a government client. You will operate at a systems and organisational level, shaping how data is ingested, processed, governed, and consumed across multiple teams and services.
This role goes beyond hands-on engineering — it requires deep technical authority, cross-team influence, and strategic decision-making to ensure platforms are secure, scalable, resilient, and aligned to long-term business outcomes.
Key Responsibilities
- Define and own the technical strategy for data platform architecture, balancing short-term delivery with long-term scalability and maintainability.
- Lead the design of complex, distributed data systems, including batch and real-time processing at scale.
- Establish platform-wide standards, patterns, and best practices for data engineering, reliability, and security.
- Act as a technical authority and mentor, guiding senior and lead engineers across teams.
- Drive architecture decisions across multiple squads, ensuring alignment with enterprise and government standards.
- Partner with architects, product leaders, and stakeholders to translate ambiguous requirements into scalable technical solutions.
- Ensure high availability, fault tolerance, and low-latency performance across critical data services.
- Champion engineering excellence, including TDD, BDD, observability, and continuous delivery practices.
- Oversee data modelling standards and governance, ensuring consistency, lineage, and