Contract Principal Software Architect

Spectrum IT are working with an enterprise digital platform to recruit a Contract Principal Software Architect to support their widely used, real-world consumer technology platform. This is an OUTSIDE IR35 role, for an initial 6 months contract and will be hybrid working: Instead, they will be working within a live production estate, balancing existing technology, legacy decisions, technical debt, team structures and commercial priorities against the need to improve scalability, resilience, maintainability and customer experience. You will work closely with Engineering, Product, Platform and Technical Operations teams to make pragmatic architectural decisions that support both immediate delivery and longer-term platform strategy. The successful contractor will need to be comfortable getting into the detail of system design, service boundaries, integrations, data ownership, cloud architecture and non-functional requirements, while providing technical direction across multiple engineering teams. Make and guide technical decisions around distributed systems, APIs, integrations, data and cloud architecture. Ensure security, resilience, observability, performance and scalability are incorporated into solution designs. Identify architectural risks, technical debt and platform constraints, and establish appropriate mitigation strategies. Promote consistent architectural standards, engineering quality and technical decision-making. Support and mentor senior engineers and technical leads, helping embed architectural thinking within delivery teams. Strong commercial experience working as a Software Architect / Principal Architect within complex software environments. Proven experience designing distributed systems and modern software platforms. Strong understanding of software architecture patterns, APIs, integrations and cloud-based systems. Experience operating within Microsoft Azure or another major cloud environment. Strong understanding of SQL and NoSQL data technologies and the architectural considerations involved in selecting appropriate data stores. Experience working with transactional systems where data integrity, consistency, resilience and reliability are critical. Strong understanding of non-functional architecture, including security, scalability, performance, observability and resilience. NET / C# Microsoft Azure Python SQL and NoSQL data technologies Modern DevOps and CI/CD practices This role would suit a software focused architect who is comfortable operating between high-level architecture and hands-on technical detail. Candidates for this role must be within a commutable distance of Uxbridge due to the hybrid working requirement. Spectrum IT Recruitment (South) Limited is acting as an Employment Business in relation to this vacancy