Vanta

Principal Software Engineer, Program Structure

Vanta$150K — $180K *
US-AnywhereRemote in Canada
Enterprise Technology
Less than 5 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 5+ years in technical leadership roles at larger organizations
  • Experience balancing customer needs with long-term and short-term solutions
  • Strong communication skills with cross-functional teams
  • Proven ability to mentor and uplift engineering teams
  • Self-starter with startup and scaling experience
  • Expertise in multi-year architectural changes
  • Interest or prior experience in security

Responsibilities

  • Identify and solve high-impact problems, leading cross-functional projects
  • Set technical direction for the engineering team ensuring high quality
  • Design and develop new product features using modern frameworks
  • Tackle ambiguous problems and long-term challenges for the company
  • Make strategic tradeoffs considering priorities and user experience
  • Act as a cultural beacon and mentor for junior engineers
  • Own product functionality and infrastructure leveraging TypeScript and Node.js

Benefits

  • 100% covered medical, dental, and vision benefits with dependents coverage
  • Pension contribution
  • 16 weeks fully paid parental leave
  • Health & wellness stipend
  • Remote workspace stipend
  • Flexible work hours and location
  • 21 days of PTO and 80 hours of sick leave
  • Company paid holidays (8 to 11 based on location)
  • Virtual team building and company events
Full Job Description
Vanta's Governance and Compliance platform is the operating layer enterprises trust to run their security programs. We are hiring an engineer who will own the architectural foundation that makes it work for their most complex organizational structures.

Program Structure and Trust is a newly chartered group at Vanta with a focused mission: build the enterprise org model that lets customers bring their compliance and security structure - product lines, business units, isolated data environments, cross-cutting audits, scoped approvals, and data residency requirements - natively into the platform. The problems this team solves determine whether Vanta can serve the enterprise customers it's increasingly winning.

This is the defining technical role of the group. The Principal Engineer owns the design, phased delivery, and long-term technical direction of Vanta's enterprise org model - a multi-quarter initiative that cuts across the platform and establishes the foundation for how enterprise customers structure, segment, and operate inside Vanta.

Visit our Vanta Engineering Blog to learn more about what our team is working on!

What you'll do as a Principal Engineer at Vanta:
  • Own the design and multi-quarter delivery of Vanta's enterprise org model, including hierarchical product lines and business units, isolated data access and ownership, cross-cutting audit workflows, scoped approvals, and EU and GovCloud data residency support
  • Define and evolve the core abstractions that let the platform absorb structurally diverse, often conflicting enterprise requirements - solving for the general case rather than one-off customer accommodations
  • Retrofit a live production system toward a multi-tenant org structure: design safe migration paths, sequence delivery incrementally, and preserve continuity for existing customers as the architecture evolves
  • Carve out and ship meaningful customer value each quarter while progressing toward the full solution - this requires product judgment, direct engagement with enterprise customers, and the discipline to draw clean increment lines through a complex problem space
  • Drive execution across squads outside your direct area, building alignment through technical clarity and credibility rather than authority
  • Partner with Engineering leadership, Product, and Design to translate the long-term vision for enterprise structure into phased, deliverable work
  • Set the technical standard for the group - define patterns others build to, shape architecture across teams, and model the engineering excellence the Program Structure and Trust charter is organized around


How to be successful in this role:
  • 15+ years of deep backend engineering experience with a track record of leading complex, multi-quarter technical initiatives in fast-paced, product-focused environments
  • Designed platform abstractions that absorbed messy, conflicting enterprise requirements across a diverse customer base - you've solved for the general case, not the loudest customer request
  • A track record of shipping in stages: you've moved large, structurally complex problems forward incrementally, with each phase standing on its own, without getting ahead of what customers and the product can absorb
  • A history of operating effectively across squads and teams you don't own - alignment built through technical clarity and credibility, not org chart proximity
  • Deep familiarity with enterprise architectural patterns: tenancy models, role-based access control, data isolation, scoped permissions, cross-tenant operations, and access boundary design
  • Strong communication skills - you make complex systems legible to engineering leadership, product partners, and customer-facing stakeholders, in writing and in the room
  • Data residency or GovCloud exposure is a plus; the right person ramps on this in a quarter once the core structural problems are in hand
  • Open to using AI to amplify your skills and strengthen your work - demonstrating curiosity, a willingness to learn, and sound judgment in applying AI responsibly to improve efficiency and impact.


What you can expect as a Vanta'n in Canada:
  • Industry-competitive salary and equity
  • 100% covered medical, dental, and vision benefits with dependents coverage
  • Pension contribution
  • 16 weeks paid Parental Leave for all new parents
  • Health & wellness stipend
  • Remote workspace, internet, and cellphone stipend
  • Flexible work hours and location
  • 21 days of Vacation Time and 80 hours of Sick Leave
  • 11 company-paid holidays
  • Virtual team building activities, lunch and learns, and other company-wide events!
  • Offices in SF, NYC, London, Dublin, Tel Aviv, and Sydney


#LI-remote

Referral Instructions

If you are being referred for the role, please contact that person to apply on your behalf.

About Vanta

Vanta is a software company that provides automated security and compliance solutions for businesses. The company's platform offers a range of services, including risk assessments, compliance monitoring, and security audits. Vanta's platform is designed to help businesses manage their security and compliance needs more efficiently and effectively. The company was founded in 2017 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Learn more about Vanta
Size
50 employees
Industry
Founded
2017
Revenue
$1 million

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