Principal Software Engineer, Data Platform

Company Overview

With 80,000 customers across 150 countries, UKG is the largest U.S.-based private software company in the world. And we're only getting started. Ready to bring your bold ideas and collaborative mindset to an organization that still has so much more to build and achieve? Read on.

At UKG, you get more than just a job. You get to work with purpose. Our team of U Krewers are on a mission to inspire every organization to become a great place to work through our award-winning HR technology built for all.

Here, we know that you're more than your work. That's why our benefits help you thrive personally and professionally, from wellness programs and tuition reimbursement to U Choose - a customizable expense reimbursement program that can be used for more than 200+ needs that best suit you and your family, from student loan repayment, to childcare, to pet insurance. Our inclusive culture, active and engaged employee resource groups, and caring leaders value every voice and support you in doing the best work of your career. If you're passionate about our purpose - people -then we can't wait to support whatever gives you purpose. We're united by purpose, inspired by you.

About the Role:

This staff level role leads the technical strategy and execution for a large-scale data platform built on Google Cloud. The platform transforms extensive customer datasets into advanced analytical outputs and derived metrics. As the most technically skilled engineer on the team, this person drives architectural direction, mentors engineers, and ensures the platform is secure, scalable, and reliable. The role includes close collaboration with a dedicated Data Science team that provides statistical methods and analytical models, which this engineer will help integrate and operationalize.

Key Responsibilities:

• Architect and evolve a cloud-native data platform using BigQuery, Dataflow, Dataform, Pub/Sub, Dataproc, Cloud Storage.

• Build scalable data ingestion, transformation, and aggregation pipelines that support high-volume HCM datasets.

• Collaborate with the Data Science team to operationalize their models, quantitative logic, and statistical frameworks-without owning statistical methodology design.

• Implement end-to-end data workflows that generate aggregated insights and derived metrics at scale.

• Engineer strong privacy, compliance, and anonymization mechanisms into all data pipelines (masking, thresholding, auditing).

• Translate analytical requirements into technical designs and execution plans in partnership with product and data stakeholders.

• Lead architecture reviews, performance tuning, cost optimization, and reliability engineering initiatives.

• Mentor engineers; guide design reviews, coding standards, and technical best practices.

• Troubleshoot complex issues involving distributed processing, data-quality anomalies, or system bottlenecks.

• Introduce new GCP tools or frameworks as needed to support long-term scalability and maintainability.

Basic Qualifications:

• 8+ years of software engineering experience, including 3+ years in senior or staff-level positions.

• Deep experience building distributed data systems using GCP services, including BigQuery, Dataflow (Beam), Dataform, and Pub/Sub.

• Strong programming skills in Python, Java, Scala, or similar languages used in data engineering.

• Strong understanding of data modeling, partitioning strategies, schema evolution, and cost-efficient query optimization.

• Experience designing security-first data pipelines with privacy-preserving transformations.

• Ability to break ambiguous problems into structured designs and actionable plans.

• Demonstrated ability to mentor engineers and influence technical direction across teams.

• Strong experience integrating data-science workflows or ML/analytical models into production systems.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with HCM, payroll, or other HR/enterprise data domains.

• Background supporting analytics-driven products, metrics systems, or derived-indicator pipelines.

• Experience using Dataform for SQL transformation management and production model organization.

• Familiarity with statistical concepts or time-series patterns (not for model creation, but for effective collaboration with Data Science).

• Experience with data lineage, data-quality scoring, observability systems, and automated validation frameworks.

• Experience with Cloud Composer, Dataproc, or streaming architectures for near-real-time data processing.

• Track record shaping long-term architecture or leading cross-organizational platform initiatives

Where we're going

UKG is on the cusp of something truly special. Worldwide, we already hold the #1 market share position for workforce management and the #2 position for human capital management. Tens of millions of frontline workers start and end their days with our software, with billions of shifts managed annually through UKG solutions today. Yet it's our AI-powered product portfolio designed to support customers of all sizes, industries, and geographies that will propel us into an even brighter tomorrow

Equal Opportunity Employer

UKG is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, disability, religion, sex, age, national origin, veteran status, genetic information, and other legally protected categories.

View The EEO Know Your Rights poster (https://www.eeoc.gov/sites/default/files/2022-10/EEOC_KnowYourRights_screen_reader_10_20.pdf)

UKG participates in E-Verify. View the E-Verify posters here (https://www.e-verify.gov/sites/default/files/everify/posters/EVerifyParticipationPoster.pdf) .

It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.

Disability Accommodation in the Application and Interview Process

For individuals with disabilities that need additional assistance at any point in the application and interview process, please email UKGCareers@ukg.com .

The pay range for this position is base salary of $142,100 to $200,000, however, base pay offered may vary depending on skills, experience, job-related knowledge and location. This position is also eligible for a short-term incentive and a long-term incentive as part of total compensation. Information about UKG's comprehensive benefits can be reviewed on our careers site at https://www.ukg.com/about-us/careers/benefits

It is the policy of Ultimate Software to promote and assure equal employment opportunity for all current and prospective Peeps without regard to race, color, religion, sex, age, disability, marital status, familial status, sexual orientation, pregnancy, genetic information, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, ancestry, citizenship status, veteran status, and any other legally protected status entitled to protection under federal, state, or local anti-discrimination laws. This policy governs all matters related to recruitment, advertising, and initial selection of employment. It shall also apply to all other aspects of employment, including, but not limited to, compensation, promotion, demotion, transfer, lay-offs, terminations, leave of absence, and training opportunities.