
Principal Software Engineer
AlphaSense
full-time
Posted on:
Location Type: Remote
Location: Canada
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Salary
💰 CA$202,000 - CA$278,000 per year
Job Level
Tech Stack
About the role
- Own the architecture and evolution of our large-scale data extraction and normalization platform
- Design systems that process hundreds of thousands of records across heterogeneous sources (PDF, HTML, APIs, XLS) with high reliability
- Define and implement strategies to minimize human-in-the-loop validation through AI-based validation, confidence scoring, provenance tracking, and deterministic safeguards
- Establish clear system contracts for correctness, traceability, and confidence (e.g., “where did this number come from?”)
- Balance AI-driven approaches with procedural and rules-based systems where they improve reliability and explainability
- Identify and remediate architectural and operational bottlenecks impacting scale, accuracy, and developer velocity
- Act as the technical authority to block poor designs, redesign critical systems, and introduce new platforms or tooling when necessary
- Partner with product and downstream consumers to define quality bars, SLAs, and success metrics
- Serve as a technical escalation point for production issues, reliability failures, and systemic risks
- Mentor senior engineers, shape technical culture, and raise expectations for system design and execution
- Contribute to long-term technical strategy while remaining hands-on with critical implementations
Requirements
- 15+ years of experience building and operating large-scale production systems
- Proven experience designing data ingestion, extraction, or processing systems at scale
- Deep expertise in one or more of:
- Distributed systems
- Data platforms and pipelines
- AI/ML-powered extraction or classification systems
- Platform or infrastructure engineering
- Demonstrated ability to design trustworthy systems that combine probabilistic (AI) and deterministic approaches
- Strong understanding of system reliability, observability, failure modes, and iterative hardening
- Experience reducing operational or human overhead through better system design
- Track record of technical leadership across teams without formal people management
- Comfortable operating in ambiguity and driving clarity where none exists
- Passion for using AI responsibly and effectively to deliver scalable, high-confidence systems.
- Nice to Have:
- Experience with document understanding, NLP, or financial data extraction
- Experience building provenance, lineage, or confidence-scoring systems
- Familiarity with cloud-native architectures and modern data stacks
- Experience shaping or owning internal platforms used by multiple teams
Benefits
- Equity
- Generous benefits program
Applicant Tracking System Keywords
Tip: use these terms in your resume and cover letter to boost ATS matches.
Hard Skills & Tools
data extractiondata normalizationAI-based validationconfidence scoringprovenance trackingdistributed systemsdata platformsdata pipelinessystem reliabilitydocument understanding
Soft Skills
technical leadershipmentoringproblem-solvingoperating in ambiguitydriving claritycollaborationcommunicationcritical thinkingsystem designexecution