What are the responsibilities and job description for the Principal Java Engineer (Remote) position at Aspira?
- Please Note: Applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States. Aspira is unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of employment visas, now or in the future.***
For more than 40 years, Aspira has been the market-leading provider of software and services that help public agencies protect natural and cultural resources while making them accessible for all. Our platform supports everything from campground reservations to hunting licenses, helping millions of people discover, enjoy, and care for the outdoors.
We share our client partners’ mission: to steward resources for future generations, create opportunities for genuine enjoyment of the outdoors today, and expand access so more people can experience its benefits.
Aspira is transforming its technology and service model to give agencies more capacity and insight—streamlined tools, smarter automation, and better connections with their communities. Our goal is simple: make it easier for our clients to conserve what matters most and for their customers to enjoy it to the fullest.
Job Description
What You Do: Aspira is seeking an experienced and forward-thinking Principal Java Engineer to join our Platform Services team. This position requires deep technical expertise, thorough understanding of architecture patterns, experience working with existing applications, and excellent problem-solving skills with a strategic, analytical approach. This will be a hands-on role, with 75% time spent on coding and 25% on thought leadership.
Key Responsibilities
- Solution Design: Architect comprehensive solutions that meet business requirements using a combination of technologies, including Java, cloud services, middleware and front end.
- Legacy Modernization: Lead initiatives to modernize legacy systems, integrating new technologies to enhance performance and scalability.
- Technical Leadership: Provide guidance and mentorship to development teams, promoting best practices, and fostering a culture of innovation.
- System Observability & Monitoring: Research and Design monitoring strategies using tools such as New Relic, or equivalent for system health.
- Feature Flag & Release Management: Lead investigation, implementation, and integration of feature flag frameworks for controlled rollouts and A/B testing.
- Architectural Principles Application: Develop proofs of concept, reference architectures, and integration strategies.
- Collaboration: Work across the aisle with cross-functional stakeholders, leads and other architects to define system needs, deliver optimal solutions and drive innovation.
- Create, maintain. monitor and enforce technical modernization vision and roadmap for multiple related applications.
- Identify opportunities for improvement and recommend best practices for implementations and custom solutions
- Explore and integrate technologies and market solutions to enhance system capabilities.
- 30 Days:
- Learn and understand the system, application, setup and code
- Integrate with the teams, developers, managers
- Meet with manager weekly and discuss progress.
- 60 Days:
- Be a part of the App Support team for 4-6 weeks and learn the ropes
- Start discussion and documentation for observed problems
- 90 Days:
- Identified work streams and initiatives that need focus
- Working independently on specific problems/issues/initiatives
Experience:
- Minimum 15 years of experience in solution architecture, system design, and enterprise application development.
- Minimum 12 years of experience and expertise in building Java/JEE enterprise applications in cloud-native and hybrid environments.
- Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, MIS, Software Engineering, IT, or related field
- Infrastructure build out (e.g. CI, deployment orchestration, observability, and A/B test infrastructure)
- Security monitoring, vulnerability assessments, system profiling and integrating security best practices into the architecture.
- Proven track record of evaluating emerging technologies and recommending adoption strategies for enterprise-wide impact.
- Effective communicator with the ability to influence and work across global teams.
- Must be proficient in: Java Spring Framework, Java EE, Java SE, OOP principles, SQL, and SQL Server.
- Must have experience with RESTful APIs and microservices.
- Proven experience with React and modern JavaScript/TypeScript development.
- Proficiency in AWS services (e.g., EC2, S3, RDS, Lambda etc.)
- Experience with programming tools (GitHub, Eclipse, IntelliJ) and CI/CD pipelines (Jenkins, GitHub CI/CD, Docker, Kubernetes) and DevOps automation concepts.
Hiring Process: The hiring process outlined below is a rough overview, and is subject to change based on business priority, interviewer availability, etc.
- Virtual Interview: Recruiter Screen w/ Talent Acquisition Manager
- Virtual Interview: Technical Screen w/ Hiring Manager
- Virtual Interview: Team Interview w/ Key Stakeholders and/or Team Members