Principal Software Engineer

We are seeking a Principal Software Engineer to serve as a technical authority for Ally's API Core Engineering division. You will lead the design, development, and evolution of our API platform, frameworks, and tooling that power enterprise-scale services. You'll partner closely with platform, security, SRE, and application teams to drive adoption, reliability, and developer productivity across the SDLC.

The Work Itself

• Act as a technical authority across design, coding, testing, debugging, deployment, and support for the API platform and developer tooling.
• Own the platform roadmap for API Core Engineering in partnership with product and platform leadership; drive architectural decisions and standards.
• Design and implement applications, frameworks, CLIs, and libraries that improve developer productivity, reliability, and SDLC efficiency.
• Build and maintain platform services and components in Node.js (TypeScript/JavaScript); contribute high-quality, testable, and observable code.
• Develop comprehensive automated tests using Node.js testing frameworks (e.g., Jest, Mocha, Chai) and enforce testing best practices.
• Design and enhance CI/CD pipelines, tooling, and templates using GitLab CI, Python, and shell scripting; champion release automation and quality gates.
• Lead upgrades, operational support, and incident response for the API platform; drive root cause analysis and long-term resiliency improvements.
• Architect and deliver solutions on public cloud (AWS preferred), leveraging Infrastructure as Code (Terraform) and modern DevOps practices.
• Define and evolve standards for API and microservices (REST, security, observability, performance, documentation).
• Partner with enterprise development teams to accelerate adoption of the API gateway and internal frameworks; provide guidance, patterns, and enablement.
• Mentor engineers, perform design/PR reviews, and cultivate engineering excellence and platform thinking.

• 7+ years of relevant experience
• Bachelor's Degree in relevant field(s) of study or equivalent, * 7+ years of professional software engineering experience, with deep expertise in Node.js and TypeScript/JavaScript.
• 2+ years in senior or principal roles preferred
• Proficiency in Python and scripting (Bash/Zsh) for tooling, automation, and CI/CD integration.
• Strong experience with automated testing in Node.js (Jest, Mocha, Chai or equivalent) and a quality-first mindset.
• Hands-on experience building and operating services on public cloud (AWS strongly preferred).
• Experience designing and developing APIs or microservices (REST), including versioning, authentication/authorization, and documentation.
• Proven experience with DevOps toolchains: GitLab (CI/CD), Terraform (IaC), and Git-based workflows.
• Strong understanding of software architecture, reliability, performance, and observability (logging, metrics, tracing).
• Strategic thinker with hands-on problem-solving skills.
• Experience with API Gateways (e.g., Kong, Apigee, AWS API Gateway, NGINX) including policies, plugins, and operational support.
• Background working with or within Platform/Enablement teams; experience driving enterprise-wide tooling adoption.
• AWS certifications and/or deep AWS service knowledge (ECS/EKS/Lambda, API Gateway, IAM, CloudWatch, CloudFormation/Terraform).
• Familiarity with containerization and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes), and secrets/config management.
• Experience establishing coding standards, reusable templates, golden paths, and developer portals.

Ally's compensation program offers market-competitive base pay and pay-for-performance incentives (bonuses) based on achieving personal and company goals. But Ally's total compensation - or total rewards - extends beyond your paycheck and is designed to support and enrich your personal and professional life, including: * Time Away: competitive holiday and flexible paid-time-off, including time off for volunteering and voting. * Planning for the Future: plan for the near and long term with an industry-leading 401K retirement savings plan with matching and company contributions, student loan and 529 educational assistance programs, tuition reimbursement, and other financial well-being programs. * Supporting your Health & Well-being: flexible health and insurance options including dental and vision, pre-tax Health Savings Account with employer contributions and a total well-being program that helps you and your family stay on track physically, socially, emotionally, and financially. * Building a Family: adoption, surrogacy, and fertility support as well as parental and caregiver leave, back-up child and adult/elder day care program and childcare discounts. * Work-Life Integration: other benefits including LifeMatters Employee Assistance Program, subsidized and discounted Weight Watchers program and other employee discount programs.

Ally Financial only succeeds when its people do - and that's more than some cliché people put on job postings. We live this stuff! We see our people as, well, people - with interests, families, friends, dreams, and causes that are all important to them. Our focus is on the health and safety of our teammates as well as work-life balance and diversity and inclusion. From generous benefits to a variety of employee resource groups, we strive to build paths that encourage employees to stretch themselves professionally. We want to help you grow, develop, and learn new things. You're constantly evolving, so shouldn't your opportunities be, too?, Ally Financial is a customer-centric, leading digital financial services company with passionate customer service and innovative financial solutions. We are relentlessly focused on "Doing it Right" and being a trusted financial-services provider to our consumer, commercial, and corporate customers. For more information, visit www.ally.com. Ally is an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusion in the workplace. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, color, sex, religion, national origin, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, pregnancy status, marital status, military or veteran status, genetic disposition or any other reason protected by law. Where permitted by applicable law, must have received or be willing to receive the COVID-19 vaccine by date of hire to be considered, if not currently employed by Ally. We are committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodation to applicants with physical or mental disabilities. For accommodation requests, email us at work@ally.com. Ally will not discriminate against any qualified individual who is capable of performing the essential functions of the job with or without reasonable accommodation.