Principal Software Engineer - Emerging Technology & AI - Remote

CSAA Insurance Group, a AAA Insurer

1d • $177,525 - $236,650 • Remote

About The Position

CSAA Insurance Group is hiring a remote Principal Software Engineer focused on emerging technology and AI experimentation. The role is a senior, hands-on technical leadership position that designs rapid prototypes, proofs of concept, and pilots; evaluates platforms, integrations, and architecture; and helps translate validated concepts into scalable solutions for delivery teams. The engineer partners across technology and business organizations to shape technical standards, mentor engineers, solve complex challenges, and introduce technologies and practices that improve development, quality, and delivery.

The position leads technical experiments involving AI, generative AI, agentic AI, intelligent document processing, cloud services, and other emerging technologies. It assesses feasibility, architecture, platform fit, security, governance, integration strategy, risks, and potential enterprise value. The engineer creates working software and integrations sufficient to validate assumptions, documents findings and reusable patterns, and provides clear guidance when transitioning validated concepts to engineering, platform, or delivery teams.

This role collaborates with Enterprise Architecture, AI Strategy & Enablement, business sponsors, Security, Data, Risk, Legal, Procurement, platform teams, vendors, and delivery organizations. It is remote within the United States, except Hawaii and Alaska, with travel as needed for team and other in-person meetings. CSAA does not provide visa sponsorship; applicants must be authorized to work indefinitely in the United States.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering, technology, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and 10+ years of progressive software engineering experience.
• 10 years of software development experience.
• Knowledge of and experience with technologies and platforms relevant to the role.
• Experience with cloud-native services such as AWS Lambda, DynamoDB, and S3.
• Experience with build, integration, and deployment tools such as Jenkins and Maven.
• Experience with programming languages and frameworks such as Java/J2EE, Python, Node.js, JavaScript/TypeScript, and React.
• Applicable certifications aligned to the technology stack.
• Familiarity with cloud-native services and architectures, including compute, storage, and database services.
• Actively contribute to company culture, for example by supporting employee resource groups, mentoring, volunteering, or joining cross-functional projects.
• Champion company cultural norms, including using cameras when appropriate for onboarding and relationship-building.
• Demonstrate an ownership mindset and think beyond the boundaries of one's own area.
• Travel as needed for the role, including divisional or team meetings and other in-person meetings.
• Meet business needs, which may include investing extra time or helping other teams.
• Be authorized to work indefinitely in the United States; visa sponsorship is not provided.

Responsibilities

• Evaluate and apply AI, generative AI, agentic AI, and other emerging technologies to enterprise use cases.
• Translate ambiguous opportunities into technical hypotheses, experiments, prototypes, and recommendations.
• Provide technical guidance and influence technology choices, architecture patterns, and enterprise adoption decisions.
• Partner with Enterprise Architecture to evaluate platform fit, integration strategy, security, governance, and reusable patterns.
• Mentor engineers and technical partners while remaining directly responsible for technical execution.
• Lead the technical design of proofs of concept, prototypes, and controlled pilots across technologies and enterprise use cases.
• Build software and integrations to validate feasibility, architecture assumptions, platform capabilities, and risks without over-engineering experiments.
• Create design artifacts, experiment documentation, technical decision records, and reusable patterns that meet enterprise architecture and engineering standards.
• Hands-on test APIs, cloud services, AI platforms, data sources, vendor products, and emerging technology frameworks.
• Support transition of validated concepts to engineering, platform, or delivery teams with architecture and implementation guidance.
• Write maintainable prototype code and apply engineering practices suited to each experiment's scope and risk.
• Use modern build, integration, testing, source control, and automation practices to make experiments reproducible, secure, and credible.
• Review prototype code and integrations and provide actionable feedback to improve quality, reliability, and reuse.
• Diagnose and resolve technical issues involving applications, APIs, cloud services, AI platforms, data sources, and integrations.
• Document assumptions, tradeoffs, constraints, and risks, and determine whether results support scaling, further evaluation, deferral, or stopping.
• Monitor emerging technologies and methodologies, assess their maturity and value, and identify candidates for enterprise experimentation.
• Convert experiment findings into technical guidance, platform recommendations, reference patterns, standards input, or decision criteria.
• Provide expert input on experiment scope, feasibility, dependencies, data needs, risks, success criteria, and effort.
• Plan and drive time-boxed experiments with clear learning objectives and decision-oriented outputs, balancing speed with engineering rigor, security, governance, and architecture requirements.
• Collaborate with technical, business, risk, legal, procurement, vendor, platform, and delivery stakeholders.
• Explain technical concepts, findings, tradeoffs, and recommendations to technical and non-technical stakeholders; demonstrate prototypes and communicate what was tested, learned, and remains uncertain.
• Travel as needed for divisional or team meetings and other in-person meetings.
• Support company culture through activities such as employee resource groups, mentoring, volunteering, and cross-functional projects.

Benefits

• Total compensation package.
• Annual bonus eligibility for most roles.
• 401(k) with company match.
• Career growth and development support from leaders and mentors.
• Remote-first flexible workplace, with flexibility to work from various locations, including CSAA offices.

What This Job Offers

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