I'm hiring a Principal Engineer to drive the 18-month modernization of our core product, and I'm writing this post myself because I want the right person reading it, not a recruiter. Here's what I want. I want curiosity. You can't help digging into a requirement to figure out what the user actually needs. You have opinions on how the product should work for users, and you care whether they're satisfied. You read a PR and notice the option not taken. You sit across from a hands-on CIO who partners with you, and push back when an idea doesn't fit, with reasoning, not vibes. AI is already in your IDE. You ship with it daily. You have opinions on what Claude is good and bad at. You're 7+ years in. You've owned real architecture, not just executed someone else's. You've stayed somewhere long enough to see a multi-year project through, more than once. You've written enough production code in Node, React, and SQL to be respected by the team. You've translated user needs into systems even when product managers did the heavy lifting. You lead by example because you'd rather show than tell. Here's what you'd do: Drive the modernization architecture of our core product, partnering with a senior architect and me. Stay hands-on with code on the architecturally significant work Translate user and business needs into systems, and expand on them when the requirements miss the real problem Set engineering standards across the team, including how we use AI Mentor team leads and senior developer by being someone worth learning from You can lead people. How much is up to you. What you won't do is HR overhead: comp cycles, performance machinery, paperwork. I handle the bureaucracy, so you focus on the work, the coaching, and the technical direction. This isn't right if you want to stop coding, prefer a big company with a process for everything, or need a roadmap handed to you. It is right if you've been waiting for a role where a CIO actually partners with you and trusts your judgment, where AI tools are encouraged not policed, where B2B work feels real because you can see it ship, and where the team is small enough that you matter. We're a $300M B2B promotional products distributor that still runs like a small company. Past the startup chaos, not drowning in process. About ten developers across the US and India. Strong benefits. Remote in the US; no relocation is needed. Office access if you're near one. Minimal travel. US work authorization required at hire; no visa sponsorship for this role. If this sounds like the role you've been waiting for, please apply. Application materials include within a resume, one link to something you have built or written — either submitted separately or included at the bottom of your resume — and responses to three short-answer questions.