IT Software Engineer 5 ( 2x positions)

Our client, Caterpillar, is seeking an experienced Lead Software Engineer to help design and build highly scalable, cloud-native applications that support critical business operations worldwide. This is an opportunity to work on modern distributed systems, drive architectural decisions, and influence the technical direction of enterprise-scale platforms leveraging AWS, Java, Spring Boot, microservices, and event-driven architectures.

If you are passionate about building robust cloud solutions, leading technical initiatives, and mentoring engineering teams while remaining hands-on with development, this role offers a unique opportunity to make a significant impact., * Lead the design and development of cloud-native applications and distributed systems using Java and AWS.

• Architect scalable microservices and define integration patterns, service boundaries, and API contracts.
• Build and maintain RESTful APIs and event-driven services for high-volume enterprise platforms.
• Drive technical decisions around resiliency, fault tolerance, scalability, and system performance.
• Implement best practices for CI/CD, infrastructure-as-code, observability, logging, monitoring, and tracing.
• Collaborate with Product Owners, Architects, and Engineering teams to deliver business-critical solutions.
• Conduct code reviews, mentor engineers, and establish engineering standards and best practices.
• Troubleshoot production issues and improve application reliability and operational excellence.
• Identify and address technical debt while promoting long-term maintainability and system health., * Work on large-scale cloud transformation initiatives.
• Influence architecture and engineering practices across enterprise platforms.
• Collaborate with highly skilled software engineers and technical leaders.
• Gain exposure to modern AWS technologies and cloud-native development.
• Contribute to solutions that support one of the world’s most recognized industrial technology organizations.

• 10+ years of software engineering experience developing enterprise applications.
• Advanced experience with Java and/or Kotlin in production environments.
• Strong expertise designing and operating AWS cloud-native solutions.
• Deep experience with Spring Boot and modern microservices architectures.
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, resiliency patterns, and fault-tolerant application design.
• Experience building and consuming RESTful APIs and working with OpenAPI/Swagger.
• Strong SQL and relational database experience, including data modeling and performance optimization.
• Experience with NoSQL databases such as DynamoDB, MongoDB, or Cassandra.
• Hands-on experience with CI/CD pipelines and automated deployment processes.
• Experience with event-driven architectures and messaging technologies such as Kafka.
• Strong production support, troubleshooting, and performance tuning experience., * Prior experience leading or mentoring development teams.
• Experience defining enterprise architecture standards and engineering best practices.
• Strong background with observability tools, logging frameworks, metrics, and distributed tracing.
• Experience working within Agile software development environments.

Key Skills

• AWS Cloud Architecture
• Java / Kotlin
• Spring Boot
• Microservices
• REST APIs
• Kafka / Event-Driven Systems
• CI/CD Automation
• SQL & NoSQL Databases
• Distributed Systems
• Production Support & Observability, * Strong technical leadership and ownership mindset.
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills.
• Ability to influence architectural decisions across multiple teams.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
• Passion for building scalable, reliable, and maintainable software solutions.

3.43.4 out of 5 stars Chicago, IL 60661 $86 - $89 an hour - Contract