Principal Software Engineer (Search AI)

Docusign • Seattle, WA

1d • Hybrid

About The Position

The Docusign AI team is seeking a Principal Software Engineer (Search AI) to act as a seasoned subject matter expert and architect the next generation of our Search & Data Platform. As part of the Intelligent Agreement Management (IAM) initiative, our team is transforming customer-facing search capabilities to a modern, highly scalable cloud data platform. You serve as the technical architect behind the discovery engine that powers the world’s most critical agreements. You drive business growth by transforming Search from a utility into a competitive advantage and directly impacting the scalability of our entire platform. We are looking for an extensively experienced builder who loves advancing search infrastructure, distributed systems, and solving "never-been-done-before" problems at scale. You will work closely with product leaders and engineering leadership ensuring our solutions are fault-tolerant, secure, and blazingly fast, while consistently driving innovation that advances the overall business. This position is an individual contributor role reporting to the Director of Engineering, Search.

Requirements

• Basic BA/BS in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Informatics, or equivalent; an advanced degree is highly preferred
• 15+ years of software development experience in object-oriented languages (C#, Java, C++, or Go), with extensive experience gained in a corporate or relevant business environment
• 6+ years of experience with large-scale data systems and search engines (e.g., Elasticsearch, Solr) including cluster tuning, index design, and scaling search workloads in a production environment
• Proven track record of delivering search-related infrastructure or features that handle high-volume data ingestion and complex retrieval requirements
• 5+ years of experience with distributed data processing frameworks (e.g., Apache Spark, Kafka)
• 4+ years of experience building scalable services in public cloud environments (Azure, AWS, or GCP)
• Experience with Agile/Scrum methodologies, CI/CD pipelines (Git, Jenkins, Azure DevOps), and navigating teams through ambiguity and change
• Experience leading highly complex functional and cross-functional projects and teams

Nice To Haves

• Master’s or PhD degree in Computer Science or a related field
• Experience with the Microsoft technology stack (.NET Core, C#, SQL Server)
• Direct involvement in the design and operation of high-availability SaaS platforms (99.9%+ uptime)
• Familiarity with modern frontend frameworks (React) to understand how customers consume search APIs
• Experience with leveraging vectorDBs, LLMs and embedding models
• Background in LegalTech or FinTech, specifically working with OCR, unstructured document indexing, or contract lifecycle management (CLM)
• Proven track record of effective, long-range innovation that has significantly advanced a function or overall business

Responsibilities

• Conceive and develop new architectural strategies with a long-range vision, significantly accelerating the Search & Data function’s capabilities
• Drive the strategic roadmap and execution for Docusign’s search infrastructure, ensuring the platform is scalable, resilient, and capable of indexing billions of global agreements
• Design and build fault-tolerant, high-throughput search systems using microservices architecture (primarily C#/.NET or Java) and provide technical direction to the team
• Lead the implementation and optimization of search clusters to ensure sub-second query performance across petabytes of data with enterprise-grade security and reliability
• Represent the engineering function in large-scale, complex cross-functional initiatives
• Act as a matrix leader to drive engineering best practices and translate product requirements into technical designs
• Be a seasoned coach and mentor to experienced team members
• Identify and resolve production issues, ensuring 99.99% availability for critical search services
• Extract added value by continuously raising the standards and expectations across projects and teams
• Work collaboratively across engineering functions, time zones and geographies

Benefits

• Bonus: Sales personnel are eligible for variable incentive pay dependent on their achievement of pre-established sales goals. Non-Sales roles are eligible for a company bonus plan, which is calculated as a percentage of eligible wages and dependent on company performance.
• Stock: This role is eligible to receive Restricted Stock Units (RSUs).
• Global benefits provide options for the following: Paid Time Off: earned time off, as well as paid company holidays based on region
• Paid Parental Leave: take up to six months off with your child after birth, adoption or foster care placement
• Full Health Benefits Plans: options for 100% employer paid and minimum employee contribution health plans from day one of employment
• Retirement Plans: select retirement and pension programs with potential for employer contributions
• Learning and Development: options for coaching, online courses and education reimbursements
• Compassionate Care Leave: paid time off following the loss of a loved one and other life-changing events

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal