Principal Engineer

Job summary

We are looking for people who are passionate about Engineering to join our community led team in Shared Applications Service (SAS). You will work in agile multidisciplinary teams with over 1000 engineers in a modern cloud environment using the latest technologies. Our purpose as a team is to bring technical understanding in-house for over 600 Home Office applications.

Where business needs allow, some roles may be suitable for a combination of office and home-based working. Where this is the case, employees will be expected to spend a minimum of 60% of their working time in the office . Applicants can raise any queries to the email address at the bottom of the advert.

Watch this short video to hear from members of Home Office Digital talking about the projects they work on and their experience of working here: Working for Home Office Digital.

Recruitment Event

We are hosting a Home Office Digital online recruitment event on 08/09/2026 from 13:00 to 13:45, where you can find out more about our roles, working for Home Office Digital and how to apply. Register your interest here: Home Office Digital: How to write a strong application Tickets, Tuesday, September 8 • 1 PM - 1:45 PM GMT+1 , Eventbrite

Job description

The Principal Engineer may be expected to take charge of engineering work across an ensemble of teams or in a particular area of the business. You will be responsible for ensuring that engineering work can be done effectively in their area, relying on context provided by your Lead Engineers and peers. You may be expected to line manage or supervise multiple Lead Engineers.

As a Principal Engineer, you will also have a strategic focus, providing insight to project and programme management teams to support effective resourcing decisions, and to assurance teams and processes to ensure engineering standards are consistently met. You will act as the central point of contact for engineers within your area, ensuring that systems are sustainable, maintainable, and aligned with the Government Digital and Data Profession Strategy.

Along with the other Senior, Lead and Principal engineers in your area you will be responsible for ensuring that all technical approaches being used are appropriate and endorsed and will take part in planning with senior stakeholders to make sure that product delivery and maintenance is on a firm basis. Your remit may be across the engineering function but working closely with Architects and other professions.

Tools and Technologies we use:

We would encourage applications from candidates with experience or interests in the following technologies:

• Back End – API design and middle tier design using a modern language (Java, Python, JavaScript).
• Front End– Implementing user interfaces using JavaScript, Java or equivalent languages.
• Cloud Platform AWS/Containerization/Docker/Kubernetes.

Person specification

Main Responsibilities

Your main day to day responsibilities will be:

• Supporting implementation against strategy; leading multiple engineering teams in line with our architecture and professions.
• Planning our workforce and recruiting civil servants, building a strong technical talent pool; coaching and mentoring as necessary.
• Ensuring the engineering activities undertaken in teams under your supervision are following suitable standards.
• Supporting technical decision making, feeding into roadmaps and overall strategy for the Engineering function in your area. Presenting decisions up and down the organisation clearly.
• Coordinating with other engineering leads to form an overall community, acting as the central point of contact in your area and leading collaborative efforts.

Working Pattern

This role is available on a full-time basis with the option of compressed hours working. This role is also suitable for part-time working hours, with a minimum requirement to work 3 days per week due to business requirements.

Essential Skills

You will have demonstrable experience leading engineering for large-scale, secure, data-intensive services, with the following essential skills:

• Leading the design and evolution of enterprise-scale NodeJS services (e.g. NodeJS, React, RESTful APIs, microservices) to ensure performance, scalability, and resilience in a live operational environment. (PROG)
• Defining and assuring software design standards, coding practices, and engineering governance aligned to GDS service standards and secure-by-design principles. (SWDN)
• Overseeing end-to-end systems development and delivery across multiple teams, ensuring alignment to architectural patterns (e.g. event-driven, microservices) and integration with legacy and distributed systems. (DLMG)
• Driving quality engineering practices including automated testing (unit, integration), CI/CD pipelines (e.g. Jenkins, GitHub Actions), and observability (logging, monitoring, alerting) to support high-availability services. (PDSV)
• Managing technical risk, compliance, and service sustainability, including secure handling of sensitive data, audit requirements, and alignment with Home Office governance and operational frameworks. (QUMG)
• Developing engineering capability through coaching, mentoring, and workforce planning, building strong engineering expertise and supporting continuous professional development across teams. (PEMT)

SFIA capability framework

Skills for the Information Age (SFIA) version 8 is the technical framework that sets the standard capability and development of all levels in the Home Office. This is a link to the capability framework: All skills A - Z English (sfia-online.org) .

We use set SFIA technical skills to form our interview questions and we will assess you against these technical skills during the selection process.

The essential skills listed above are reflective of the Home Office Government Digital and Data Profession Career Framework (based on the industry standard SFIA framework). Use the SFIA Levels of responsibility to understand what would be expected for each technical skills listed below.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Leadership

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• Systems development management (DLMG) - Level 5
• Software design (SWDN) - Level 4
• Programming/software development (PROG) - Level 3
• Performance management (PEMT) - Level 4
• Professional development (PDSV) - Level 5
• Quality management (QUMG) - Level 5

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £76,879, Home Office contributes

£22,271 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme.

Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

Why work for us...

Find out more information at : Benefits - Home Office Careers, but some of the primary ones are:

• A Civil Service Pension with employer contribution rates of at least 28.97%.
• In-year reward scheme for one-off or sustained exceptional personal or team achievements.
• 25 days annual leave on appointment, rising with service.
• 8 days of public holidays, plus 1 additional privilege day.
• Where business needs allow, some roles may be suitable for a combination of office and home-based working. This is a non-contractual arrangement where all employees will be expected to spend a minimum of 60% of their working time in an office.

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Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window) , and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

As part of the application process, you will be asked to complete a CV and 1000 -word personal statement:

• CV – include a brief employment history outlining for each role, the organisation, job title, dates in post, and key responsibilities and achievements. Any recent employment gaps should be explained. A second section should set out the skills and experience most relevant to this role, drawing on your career, training, and other relevant activities without repeating the employment history. Focus on the evidence that best demonstrates your capability to meet the role requirements.
• Personal statement - this should present a clear and coherent narrative explaining why you are applying, what you would bring to the role, and how your experience meets the essential criteria. Use well ‑ chosen examples to illustrate your impact, drawing on STAR ‑ style thinking where helpful, but ensure the statement reads as a single, flowing document rather than a set of isolated responses.

To ensure you are assessed on merit alone, we ask you to anonymise your application. This means removing personal identifiers such as your name, age, and place of education. You do not need to remove your employment history, job titles, or any information about your work.

Watch our three short videos on how to apply for our roles: Applying - Home Office Careers.

Problems during the application process

If you experience problems accessing this advert, or you think you’ve made a mistake on an initial application, please contact hocandidates.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk, including the vacancy reference, at least two working days before the vacancy closes. Further information can be found on our website .

Do not create or attempt to submit another application, online test or use a different Civil Service Jobs account to proceed as this would be in violation of the candidate declaration.

Sift Stage

The sift will be held on the CV and Personal Statement . Please read the essential skills for this position carefully. We will only consider those who meet the listed requirements.

In the event of a high number of applications received, an initial sift may be held on the CV .

Interview Stage

Candidates reaching the required standard will then be invited to attend an interview. The interview will assess your Technical Skills (SFIA Framework) and Behaviours using technical and behaviour-based questions.

At the beginning of the interview, you will be assessed on your technical capability through a technical problem-solving exercise. We will provide you with the information in the interview and you will be asked to share your screen with the panel, so you can point out various aspects.

If you are invited to an interview, you will be required to bring a range of documentation for the purposes of establishing identity and to aid any pre-employment checks. Please see the attached list of Home Office acceptable ID documents.

Sift and Interview dates

The sift will commence from 14/09/ 2026.

Interviews are expected to take place from 01/10/2026. (Subject to the Panel’s operational requirements/priorities).

Interviews will be conducted remotely via MS Teams.

We will try to meet the dates set out in the advert. There may be occasions when these dates will change. You will be provided with sufficient notice of the confirmed dates.

Further information

If you have previously made an unsuccessful application for a role with the same essential skills and are not able to demonstrate how you have developed these skills since your last application, please reconsider applying a