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Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Principal Software Engineer - **Company:** Mastercard - **Location:** O'Fallon, MO, United States - **Experience:** Expert - **Salary:** $170,000.0 - $281,000.0 - **Contract:** Permanent contract - **Skills:** Artificial Intelligence, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Cloud Computing, Cyber Security, Continuous Integration, Distributed Systems, Monitoring of Systems, Performance Tuning, Software Architecture, Systems Development Life Cycle, Reliability Engineering, Software Tools, Standard Sql, Software Engineering, Enterprise Software Applications, Cloud Platform System, Large Language Models, Software Security, Containerization, Infrastructure Automation Frameworks, Enterprise Integration, Devsecops, Microservices - **Published:** September 24, 2026 - **Apply:** https://www.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=f6148799072122e8 ## About the Role * Extensive experience designing and delivering highly scalable, resilient, and secure enterprise software solutions. * Deep expertise in software architecture, cloud platforms, microservices, distributed systems, and platform engineering. * Proven ability to influence technical strategy and architectural direction across multiple teams and business domains. * Strong experience establishing engineering standards, governance models, architecture frameworks, and operational excellence practices. * Expertise in reliability engineering, observability, performance optimization, and production operations. * Experience developing reusable platforms, shared services, and enterprise technology capabilities. * Strong understanding of modern software delivery practices, CI/CD, infrastructure automation, and DevSecOps methodologies. * Experience evaluating emerging technologies and translating technical innovation into business value. * Demonstrated success driving cross-functional technical decisions through influence and collaboration. * Exceptional communication skills with the ability to engage technical teams, executives, and business stakeholders. * Strong analytical, problem-solving, and strategic thinking capabilities. * Passion for innovation, continuous learning, and advancing engineering excellence at enterprise scale. Key Skill Sets * Software Architecture * Distributed Systems * Cloud Platforms (AWS/Azure/GCP) * Microservices * Platform Engineering * Reliability Engineering (SRE) * Observability & Monitoring * AI/LLM Engineering Solutions * DevSecOps & CI/CD * Performance & Scalability * Technical Strategy * Architecture Governance * Enterprise Integration * Engineering Standards & Best Practices ## Description The Principal Software Engineer is a senior individual contributor within Architecture & Technology (A&T), responsible for driving enterprise engineering strategy, architecture standards, and technology excellence across Mastercard. This role provides deep technical leadership across distributed systems, cloud-native platforms, resiliency, observability, and software engineering practices while influencing technology direction across multiple teams and domains. The Principal Engineer partners with senior engineering leaders, architects, and platform organizations to define architectural standards, establish reusable patterns, and guide critical technology decisions. Through technical expertise, thought leadership, and cross-functional influence, this role helps teams build secure, scalable, reliable, and operationally excellent solutions that align with Mastercard's long-term engineering strategy. Role * Provide technical leadership and architectural guidance across multiple engineering organizations, driving consistent adoption of engineering standards, best practices, and enterprise technology patterns. * Partner with platform CTOs, architects, and engineering leaders to evaluate technology investments, transformation initiatives, and architecture decisions. * Lead architecture reviews and technical design discussions, identifying opportunities to improve scalability, resiliency, security, performance, and operational excellence. * Define and evolve enterprise architecture patterns, reference implementations, decision frameworks, and reusable engineering capabilities. * Serve as a recognized subject matter expert in cloud-native technologies, distributed systems, platform engineering, observability, and reliability engineering. * Design and develop AI-enabled engineering tools, architecture assistants, and knowledge platforms that improve engineering productivity and decision-making. * Drive adoption of AI-powered capabilities that make architecture standards, design guidance, and engineering best practices more accessible across the organization. * Influence the evolution of Engineering Principles, SDLC, Secure Software Lifecycle Standards (SQLS), and architecture governance practices. * Guide engineering teams in selecting technologies, architectures, and platform capabilities that align with Mastercard's strategic objectives. * Promote build-once-run-many, platform reuse, and operational excellence through shared capabilities and engineering best practices. * Collaborate with Security, Infrastructure Engineering, Product Engineering, and Business Operations teams to strengthen engineering effectiveness and operational readiness. * Create technical thought leadership, architecture guidance, standards documentation, and executive-level communications that influence organizational engineering direction. * Mentor senior engineers and architects while fostering a culture of engineering excellence, innovation, and continuous improvement., All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information, and networks comes with an inherent risk to the organization and, therefore, it is expected that every person working for, or on behalf of, Mastercard is responsible for information security and must: * Abide by Mastercard's security policies and practices; * Ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the information being accessed; * Report any suspected information security violation or breach, and * Complete all periodic mandatory security trainings in accordance with Mastercard's guidelines. ## Related Videos - [DevSecOps: Injecting Security into Mobile CI/CD Pipelines](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/273-devsecops-injecting-security-into-mobile-ci-cd-pipelines) - [How building an industry DBMS differs from building a research one](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/768-how-building-an-industry-dbms-differs-from-building-a-research-one) - [Microservices: how to get started with Spring Boot and Kubernetes](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/242-microservices-how-to-get-started-with-spring-boot-and-kubernetes) - [Next Level Enterprise Architecture: Modular, Flexible, Scalable, Multichannel and AI-Ready?](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1017-next-level-enterprise-architecture-modular-flexible-scalable-multichannel-and-ai-ready) - [DevSecOps: Security in DevOps](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/36-devsecops-security-in-devops) - [The Software Engineer 2030: From Coder To AI Orchestrator? - Patrick Schnell](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1825-the-software-engineer-2030-from-coder-to-ai-orchestrator-patrick-schnell) ## Related Articles - [Highest Paying Tech Companies for Developers](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/220-highest-paying-tech-companies-for-developers) - [The Best X (Twitter) Accounts for Developers](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/294-the-best-x-twitter-accounts-for-developers) - [Why Upskilling And Reskilling is Important For Developers](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/428-why-upskilling-and-reskilling-is-important-for-developers) - [Navigating the AI Shift](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/629-navigating-the-ai-shift) - [Is Software Engineering Over-Saturated?](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/418-is-software-engineering-over-saturated) - [What is Software Engineering?](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/289-what-is-software-engineering)