Principal Engineer - Enterprise Document Generation

About this role:

Wells Fargo is seeking a Principal Engineer to join the Strategic Services & Advanced Technology (SSAT) team within the Digital Technology and Innovation group. This role will lead the architecture, design, and modernization of a next-generation Document Generation & Customer Communication Platform, shaping enterprise-grade solutions across Java-based distributed systems, legacy mainframe applications, Agentic AI and GenAI capabilities, and vendor off-the-shelf products, while upholding the highest standards of scalability, security, resiliency, and regulatory compliance in a banking environment.  This position requires a highly respected technical leader who can operate as an architect, strategist, hands-on engineer, and trusted advisor to leadership across multiple groups.
 

In this role, you will:

• Act as a trusted technical advisor to leadership, influencing highly complex engineering decisions across applications, architecture, platforms, APIs, and enterprise Document Generation technology ecosystems.

• Define and drive end-to-end architecture for high-volume, mission-critical platforms, leveraging Java, Spring Boot, microservices, APIs, event-driven systems, vendor off-the-shelf software, and modern UI frameworks such as React.

• Lead the strategy and resolution of complex, enterprise-scale technology challenges, applying long-term thinking, innovation, and architectural judgment across multiple business and engineering organizations.

• Architect and integrate Generative AI and Agentic AI solutions into the Enterprise Document Generation & Customer Communication platform, including LLM-powered applications, RAG architectures, embeddings, vector databases, orchestration frameworks, and AI-enabled developer or business workflows.

• Balance innovation with risk management, regulatory compliance, and operational stability, ensuring solutions are secure, resilient, and production-ready.

• Conduct architectural design reviews, code reviews, proofs of concept, and technology evaluations, identifying architectural risks, technical debt, and modernization opportunities, and recommending pragmatic remediation strategies.

• Mentor and guide engineers at all levels, elevating engineering standards, providing technical leadership, and fostering a culture of innovation, ownership, continuous learning, and operational excellence.

• Translate deep technical expertise and business domain knowledge across Documents, Digitization, and AI into actionable platform roadmaps and well-architected engineering solutions aligned with both tactical and strategic objectives.

• Define vision and provide technical direction for integration and adoption patterns, orchestration, observability, and operational controls within the Enterprise Document Generation & Customer Communication platform.

• Maintain awareness of industry best practices and emerging technologies across Document Generation, Customer Communications, and Agentic AI / GenAI, recommending innovations that improve operational efficiency or provide competitive advantage.

• Engage strategically with engineering leaders, architects, and executives across the enterprise, acting as a trusted expert and thought leader for Document Generation and Customer Communications platforms.

• Participate in architectural design discussions, conduct rigorous code reviews, and uphold high standards for technical documentation and engineering quality.

• Troubleshoot and resolve complex issues across development, test, and production environments, ensuring platform stability and reliability.

Required Qualifications:

• 7+ years of professional software engineering experience, or equivalent demonstrated through a combination of work experience, training, military service, or education, with progressively increasing scope and technical responsibility.

• 5+ years of experience designing, building, and owning large-scale, production-grade distributed systems, including event-driven architectures and real-time data streaming technologies such as Kafka or equivalent platforms.

• 5+ years of experience in system design and architecture for high-scale applications, with demonstrated depth in performance optimization, fault tolerance, resiliency, and operational reliability.

• 7+ years of experience in the Java ecosystem, including Core Java, Spring Boot, RESTful APIs, microservices, concurrency, and performance tuning, delivering scalable, enterprise-grade backend services, APIs, and orchestration workflows.

• 5+ years of experien