Principal Engineer - Payments Modernization

Company: Bank of America
Location: Jersey City
Posted on: April 1, 2026

Job Description:

Job Description: At Bank of America, we are guided by a common purpose to help make financial lives better through the power of every connection. We do this by driving Responsible Growth and delivering for our clients, teammates, communities and shareholders every day. Being a Great Place to Work is core to how we drive Responsible Growth. This includes our commitment to being an inclusive workplace, attracting and developing exceptional talent, supporting our teammates’ physical, emotional, and financial wellness, recognizing and rewarding performance, and how we make an impact in the communities we serve. Bank of America is committed to an in-office culture with specific requirements for office-based attendance and which allows for an appropriate level of flexibility for our teammates and businesses based on role-specific considerations. At Bank of America, you can build a successful career with opportunities to learn, grow, and make an impact. Join us! Job Description: This job is responsible for defining and leading the engineering approach for solutions at the program or portfolio level, to deliver significant business outcomes. Key responsibilities include continuously improving the design, quality, and reuse of the solution and delivering technology enablers that improve development efficiencies for the solution. Job expectations include familiarity with at least one area of engineering, acting as a “go to” reference across the organization, and applying knowledge to improve technical competencies through recruitment and development activities. Responsibilities: Develops the engineering approach for the entire program/portfolio solution and works with Architecture, to develop/analyze/deliver the implementation of technical enablers Leads the planning, definition, and design of the complex features which span multiple teams and explore solution alternatives Creates ideas on designing complex technology and solution development approaches Leads the technical oversight for teams in solution development including design reviews and code within own domain Defines the technology tool stack for the solution within ranged of internally approved and supported technologies Explores state-of-the-art technologies to improve development efficiencies, quality of test/QA coverage, and release management Leads and is responsible for the end-to-end test strategy/creation/adherence, and the integration between teams for a program/portfolio solution Position Summary: We are seeking a highly experienced and technically proficient Principal Engineer to join our team in building a next-generation wire payment processing platform hosted on AWS. This role blends leadership and architecture, requiring deep expertise in modern technologies and payment systems. In this role, you will be responsible for designing, implementing, and optimizing cloud solutions that drive our business forward and meet our clients' evolving needs. The ideal candidate will have strong experience in leading teams working in cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP), Java, Node.js, Oracle, Kafka, and RabbitMQ . This role demands a strong understanding of payment systems including Wire, ACH, and RTP, and the ability to lead teams through complex technical challenges. Leverage domain and technical expertise to set direction and drive project execution. Foresee and proactively address risks, issues, and dependencies. Work with business, operations, internal technology teams, and with vendor partners to ensure successful project delivery. Summarize, create presentations, and present initiative-specific, compelling, executive-ready presentations conveying the strategy, business case, and recommendations to Senior and Executive Leadership across product, operations, technology, and compliance. Risk Manager: Ensures proper risk discipline, controls and culture are in place to identify, escalate and debate issues. People Manager & Coach: Provides inspection, coaching and feedback to motivate, differentiate and improve performance. Driver of Business Outcomes: Delivers results by effectively prioritizing, inspecting and appropriately delegating team-work. Required Qualifications Fifteen plus years experience with: Designing and implementing scalable, secure, and cost-effective AWS cloud architectures Migrating on-premises applications and data to the AWS cloud Creating and maintaining CloudFormation templates for infrastructure management Ensuring compliance with industry standards and regulations Collaborating with clients and internal teams to gather requirements and develop solutions Optimizing existing cloud infrastructures for performance and cost-efficiency Providing technical leadership and mentoring to team members Recent experience tackling complex challenges in distributed data systems using Java (Enterprise Edition), Oracle SQL, and Python. Experience using Java/J2EE technologies to develop scalable enterprise-grade applications, libraries, and frameworks. Designed and developed solution architecture to scale backend systems with Spring framework, Spring MVC, and RESTful APIs. Hands-on experience with messaging systems like Kafka and RabbitMQ. Utilized DevOps technologies for CI/CD including Ansible, Jenkins, JFrog, and Git. Designed and implemented database development on Oracle Exadata. Proven experience in leading and mentoring a team of engineers. Strong understanding of software development, testing, deployment, and support using agile methodologies. Expert-level proficiency in Java Enterprise Edition and related frameworks (e.g., Spring, Hibernate) and advanced SQL. Excellent written and verbal communication skills. Ability to write specifications and design documents. Desired Qualifications Domain expertise in payment systems including Wire, ACH, RTP. Knowledge of ISO 20022 messaging standards. Exposure to event-driven architecture and distributed systems. Understanding of regulatory and compliance requirements in financial services. Experience with observability tools like Splunk, Prometheus, and Grafana. Knowledge of financial products data such as Equities, Fixed Income, and Derivatives. Agile/Scrum certification or experience working in agile environments. Skills: Automation Influence Result Orientation Stakeholder Management Technical Strategy Development Application Development Architecture Business Acumen Risk Management Solution Design Agile Practices Analytical Thinking Collaboration Data Management Solution Delivery Process Shift: 1st shift (United States of America) Hours Per Week: 40 Pay Transparency details US - NJ - Jersey City - 101 Hudson St - 101 Hudson (NJ2101) Pay and benefits information Pay range $156,500.00 - $230,000.00 annualized salary, offers to be determined based on experience, education and skill set. Discretionary incentive eligible This role is eligible to participate in the annual discretionary plan. Employees are eligible for an annual discretionary award based on their overall individual performance results and behaviors, the performance and contributions of their line of business and/or group; and the overall success of the Company. Benefits This role is currently benefits eligible. We provide industry-leading benefits, access to paid time off, resources and support to our employees so they can make a genuine impact and contribute to the sustainable growth of our business and the communities we serve.

Keywords: Bank of America, Brick , Principal Engineer - Payments Modernization, IT / Software / Systems , Jersey City, New Jersey