PRINCIPAL APPLICATION DEVELOPER
Los Angeles County
Wednesday, 29 April 2026
This class is the principal level in the Application Developer series and generally reports to an Information Technology manager. Incumbents possess technical expertise on one or more major systems, which are characterized by their scope, functionality, critical nature, or technical complexity. Incumbents understand and are able to apply advanced information systems concepts, principles, and methodologies of analysis and application development. Incumbents provide technical directions and supervise a team of application developers and other technology staff engaged in all phases of application development and system maintenance. Essential Job Functions. Duties of the Principal Application Developer: Provides technical expertise to project managers, department management, and/or user management regarding one or more major system development or maintenance efforts. Advises management on technical alternatives, such as languages, tools, platforms, utilities, and servers. Leads and participates in the work of a team of Application Developers engaged in the development or maintenance of the most highly technical programs. Provides technical consulting on long-range information systems planning. Programs the most specialized and complex applications. Solves the more complex application software and system performance problems. Examines performance metrics and finds opportunities for improvement. Establishes quality assurance procedures. Monitors vendors to ensure performance according to project goals and contract terms, and reports performance problems to management. As needed, assist in creating Statements of Work (SO - Ws) in support of applications development efforts. As needed, serve as a project manager. As needed, represent the department in coordinated efforts with other County departments, outside agencies, and/or vendors. As needed, supervise lower-level application development personnel.
Requirements
Requirements to Qualify:OPTION I: Graduation from an accredited college with a bachelor’s degree - in Computer Science, Information Systems, or a closely related field - - , and four (4) years of recent progressively responsible - - - , full-time, paid experience in a centralized information technology organization - - - - , coding, testing and debugging application programs. OPTION II: Two (2) years of full time, paid experience, within the last three (3) years, at the level of the Los Angeles County class of Senior Application Developer - - - - - . At the level of”: You may still qualify even if your job title isn’t exactly the same as the ones listed. What matters is that your experience is at a similar level — meaning your job involves similar responsibilities, requires comparable skills and knowledge, and takes place within a similar organizational structure. Please provide a clear explanation of your experience to demonstrate that it is at the appropriate level. OPTION III: Five (5) years of recent progressively responsible - - - , full-time paid experience, in an information technology organization, coding, testing, and debugging application programs. LICENSE:A valid California Class “C” Driver License or the ability to use an alternative method of transportation when needed to carry out job related essential functions. PHYSICAL CLASS: Physical Class 2 – Light: This class includes administrative and clerical positions requiring light physical effort that may include occasional light lifting to a 10-pound limit and some bending, stooping, or squatting. Considerable ambulation may be involved. VETERAN’S CREDIT: If you are a veteran, you may be eligible for veteran’s credit, which is an additional 10% of the total points added to a passing score. We will need a copy of your form DD 214 to review, so please include that with your application or email it to the exam analyst at RRCC - Exams@rrcc.lacounty.gov as soon as possible so, if you are eligible for veteran’s credit, we can include it before the list is available. Special Requirements Information: - To receive credit for your education, include a legible copy of your official diploma, official transcript, or letter/certificate from an accredited institution within 5 (five) days by the end of the filing period. The document should show the date the degree was conferred and be in English. If not in English, then translation is required. International degrees must be evaluated for equivalency to U.S. standards if not listed in the International Handbook of Universities or World Higher Education Database. For more information on our standards for educational documents, please visit: SDS - Inter/dhr/070812 PPG 123.pdf Official Transcript is a transcript that bears the college seal and states "official and/or copy" issued by the school's registrar office. A printout of the transcript from the school's website is NOT considered official and may result in your application being incomplete and rejected. We do not accept password-protected documents. Ensure documents are unlocked before attaching to your application or sending to the exam analyst. - - Closely related fields include:Software Engineering. Information Technology (IT)Computer Engineering. Cybersecurity. Data Science / Data Analytics. Management Information Systems (MIS)Computational Science. Informatics. Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning. Systems Engineering (with emphasis on computing systems)Network Engineering - - - Recent progressively responsible experience is defined as work experience gained within the last five (5) years that clearly shows an upward progression in the level of duties and responsibilities from one job to the next. - - - - The centralized Information Technology organization in LA County provides IT services under the Chief Information Technology official for departments or units. - - - - - Los Angeles County class of Senior Application Developer is defined as one who under direction, performs a wide range of application development related duties including analysis, design, evaluation, development, coding, testing and maintenance of complex application systems. DESIRABLE QUALIFICATIONS:Additional credit will be awarded to qualified candidates who possess the following desirable qualifications: Minimum of four (4) years of experience with a government agency supporting and developing systems within a regulated or certified environment, including Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) activities, system documentation, and coordination with regulatory or testing bodies to support audit, compliance, or certification processes (e.g., security standards, system certification, or formal validation events). Minimum of four (4) years of experience with a government agency implementing and/or supporting endpoint security, vulnerability management, and system hardening tools (e.g., vulnerability scanning, endpoint protection, and log management systems), including performing security scans, analyzing results, and implementing remediation actions to maintain system security and compliance. Minimum of four (4) years of experience with a government agency implementing and/or supporting endpoint security, vulnerability management, and system hardening tools (e.g., vulnerability scanning, endpoint protection, and log management systems), including performing security scans, analyzing results, and remediating identified vulnerabilities in accordance with established security standards. Minimum of four (4) years of experience with a government agency establishing and/or supporting controlled Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery (CI/ CD) pipelines, build and release management, and promotion processes across multiple environments (development, test, and production), including managing code promotion, integrating automated testing, and supporting controlled deployments. Minimum of four (4) years of experience supporting systems for a government agency operating in high-volume transaction environments (defined as systems processing 500,000 or more transactions per day, with peak periods exceeding 1 million transactions per day, or handling millions of records within compressed processing windows) or large-scale device deployments (defined as environments supporting 10,000 or more endpoint devices, with preference for experience managing 20,000 or more devices). This experience must include performance testing, system analysis, tuning, scalability planning, and operational monitoring, as well as the ability to identify, troubleshoot, and resolve performance issues within complex enterprise environments.