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Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Distinguished Software Engineer - **Company:** Credit Acceptance Corporation - **Location:** Bellevue, WA, United States - **Experience:** Expert - **Salary:** $279,000.0 - **Contract:** Permanent contract - **Skills:** Artificial Intelligence, Amazon Web Services, Mobile Application Development, Information Systems, Data Infrastructure, Data Security, Distributed Systems, Inventory Management Software, Machine Learning, Open Source Technology, Software Architecture, Software Engineering, Generative AI, Information Technology, Machine Learning Operations, Model Context Protocol, Marketplace, Databricks - **Published:** October 27, 2026 - **Apply:** https://www.careerbuilder.com/job-details/distinguished-software-engineer-bellevue-wa--d4abac09-11a6-4006-bce5-061f179bc793 ## About the Role Software Engineering, Continuous Improvement, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Process Improvement, Business Support, Enterprise Architecture, Testing, Cost Control, Architectural Design, Analysis Skills, * Customer Empathy: Customer Empathy is the ability to understand the perspectives, pain points, and experiences of customers. It involves actively putting oneself in the customer's shoes, comprehending their needs and challenges, and using that understanding to provide a better, more customer-centric experience. * Engineering Excellence: Engineering Excellence is about bringing great craftsmanship and thought leadership to deliver an outstanding product that delights customers and solves for the business. This involves the pursuit and achievement of high standards, best practices, innovation, and superior solutions. * One Team: A One Team mindset refers to a collaborative approach across the organization, where individuals work together seamlessly, without boundaries, as a single, cohesive team. Shared goals, open communication and mutual support create a sense of collective purpose. This enables teams to navigate challenges and pursue shared objectives more effectively. * Owner's Mindset: Owner's Mindset involves adopting a set of behaviors that reflect a sense of responsibility, accountability, strategic thinking, and a proactive approach to managing your domain. As an owner, you understand the business and your domain(s) deeply and solve for the right outcome for the domain(s) and the business., * Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or closely related field of study; or equivalent work experience * Minimum 10 years of software engineering experience or comparable depth of experience * A track record of setting and delivering multi-year technical strategy at enterprise scale, as an individual contributor rather than through a reporting line. * Depth in distributed systems architecture, and in at least two of: agentic or LLM-based systems in production; large-scale cloud migration of transactional systems; modern data platform and lakehouse architecture; machine learning platform and model serving; high-traffic consumer or marketplace applications. * Architecture ownership of agentic or LLM-based systems that reached production, including how tool and data access were governed, how the system was evaluated, and what its failure modes turned out to be. * Demonstrated ownership of a legacy-to-modern migration of systems the business runs on, including the sequencing, the cost case, and the failure modes, with production revenue at stake rather than only familiarity with the concept. * Hands-on credibility today: actively reads code, writes proofs of concept, joins design reviews, and participates in incident analysis. * Evidence of influence without authority across organizational boundaries, including work that changed direction at the executive level. * Strong written communication; architecture here is carried by documents that other people can act on without the author in the room. * Demonstrated ability to develop staff and principal engineers, and to raise the technical bar of engineers not directly managed. * Experience delivering in a regulated industry, or a clear ability to work inside audit, security, and compliance constraints without treating them as an obstacle. * Candidates must reside in or be willing to relocate to one of the following hub locations: the greater Southfield, Michigan, area; the greater Bellevue, Washington, area; or the San Francisco Bay Area, California., * Distributed Systems Mastery: Technical mastery across distributed systems and software architecture, with deep knowledge of current and emerging technologies and their business implications. * Enterprise Problem-Solving: Ability to solve enterprise-wide problems where no precedent exists and to own cross-team shared infrastructure. * Strategic Independence: Ability to define and execute technical strategy for the entire organization, partner closely with executives, mobilize resources, and drive consensus across stakeholders at all levels. * Visionary Leadership: Bold strategic thinking paired with curiosity, ingenuity, and resourcefulness; recognized industry-level thought leadership and a commitment to lifelong learning. * Customer and Market Insight: Company-wide expertise in customer needs, using deep customer and market understanding to shape product and technical strategy and anticipate the impact of industry trends. * Technical Writing: Ability to produce architecture documentation clear and complete enough for others to act on independently. * Executive Communication and Influence: Ability to build consensus and influence direction across organizational and executive boundaries without formal authority. * Talent Development: Ability to raise the technical bar of engineers across the organization, including staff and principal engineers who are not direct reports. ## Description * Recognized contribution beyond one employer, such as open source, standards work, publications, patents, or a sustained external technical presence. * Consumer lending, auto finance, insurance, or payments experience; or large-scale distributed systems experience supporting a business-critical function in another high-stakes domain. * The Model Context Protocol or comparable agent tool-integration standards, and identity and authorization design for non-human actors. * AWS and Databricks at production scale. * Experience standing up an experimentation platform, or moving an organization from tens to thousands of experiments per year. * Experience building AI-native development practice across a large engineering organization, and measuring whether it worked. * Marketplace, search, or inventory systems with more than one class of seller., To be successful in this role, Team Members need to be: * Positive by maintaining resiliency and focusing on solutions * Respectful by collaborating and actively listening * Insightful by cultivating innovation, accumulating business and role specific knowledge, demonstrating self-awareness and making quality decisions * Direct by effectively communicating and conveying courage * Earnest by taking accountability, applying feedback and effectively planning and priority setting Expectations: * Remain compliant with our policies processes and legal guidelines * All other duties as assigned * Attendance as required by department Advice! We understand that your career search may look different than others. Our hiring team wants to make sure that this would be a fit not just for us, but for you long term. If you are actively looking or starting to explore new opportunities, send us your application! P.S. We have great details around our stats, success, history and more. We're proud of our culture and are happy to share why - let's talk! Required degrees must have been earned at institutions of Higher Education which are accredited by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation or equivalent. Credit Acceptance is dedicated to providing an inclusive environment for all. We are proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and value a culturally diverse workforce. We believe in ensuring all team members demonstrate mutual respect for one another. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to protected characteristics like age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran or disability status. California Residents: Please click here for the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) notice regarding the personal information Credit Acceptance may collect from you.