Principal Engineer

The Principal Engineer is a senior individual contributor role at PetDesk, reporting directly to the Chief of Staff.

This position provides technical leadership across high-impact initiatives, partnering closely with Engineering, Product, Operations, and business stakeholders to shape the architecture, scalability, and long-term technical strategy of our platform.

The Principal Engineer will lead complex technical initiatives and drive key architectural decisions that enable teams to deliver reliable, scalable solutions.

Beyond technical leadership, this individual will bring strong operational acumen and project management experience, serving as a connective force between engineering execution and business outcomes.

They will identify opportunities to improve operational efficiency, contribute to product strategy and roadmap discussions, and ensure that technical investments align with the needs of our customers and the long-term goals of the business.

This role requires balancing strategic thinking with pragmatic execution, helping teams solve complex technical challenges while maintaining a strong focus on quality, performance, on-time delivery, and long-term maintainability.

The ideal candidate is equally comfortable defining systems architecture and rolling up their sleeves to move critical initiatives forward.

They bring a builder's mindset, a bias toward action, and the ability to influence and collaborate effectively across cross-functional teams.

• Lead the technical vision, architecture, and long-term engineering strategy for the PetDesk platform, ensuring systems are scalable, secure, resilient, and adaptable as the business grows
• Assist with the design and evolve a platform capable of supporting integrations across dozens of third-party systems — including pharmaceutical manufacturers, and clinic systems — while maintaining reliability, observability, and operational excellence
• Participate to architect data pipelines, APIs, and services that enable seamless data exchange between veterinary clinics, pet owners, drug manufacturers, and industry partners
• Partner closely with Product, Engineering, Data, and Operations to translate market opportunities and customer needs into scalable technical solutions that directly support product roadmap planning and prioritization
• Drive architectural decisions that balance speed, flexibility, maintainability, and long-term platform health in a rapidly evolving product environment
• Identify and drive operational efficiencies across the platform — working with Operations to streamline processes, reduce manual effort, and improve overall system reliability and throughput