Lead Engineer- Backend

Target; Bengaluru; On-site; INR 1,800,000 - 3,000,000; Full time

Job summary

Target Bengaluru is seeking a lead engineer with 7+ years of software design and 5+ years in building scalable backend applications. The role emphasizes JVM languages (Java/Kotlin), microservices, and cloud-native practices.

You will lead technical teams, drive product-scale initiatives, and ensure secure, observable systems. Candidates should demonstrate strong leadership, mentoring capabilities, and a deep understanding of architecture, observability, and performance optimization in a

Qualifications

• Must have strong expertise in Java/Kotlin development.
• Experience designing scalable microservices and distributed systems.
• Proficient with JVM-based frameworks and reactive programming.
• Hands-on with Kafka/RabbitMQ messaging systems.
• Experience with NoSQL/SQL databases (Cassandra, MongoDB, PostgreSQL).
• Proficient in CI/CD pipelines (Jenkins, GitLab).
• Strong unit/integration testing (Spock, JUnit).
• Cloud experience (AWS, GCP, Azure).
• Experience with Docker and Kubernetes.
• Strong monitoring/observability tooling (Grafana, Prometheus).
• Knowledge of event-driven architecture patterns.

Responsibilities

• Design scalable architecture with appropriate tech choices for services.
• Hands-on development, ensuring production-ready, deployable code.
• Plan and deliver work, mentor and coach team members.
• Ensure observability and use operational data to improve stability.
• Maintain security-first mindset across teams and codebase.
• Articulate technical strategy and business impact.
• Guide teams on complex problems and future use cases.
• Foster growth mindset and knowledge sharing across teams.

Skills

Java/Kotlin

Microservices

Spring Boot/Micronaut

Messaging Systems

Databases

CI/CD

Unit/Integration Testing

Cloud Services

Containerization

Monitoring/Observability

Event-Driven Architecture

Job description

About Us

As a Fortune 50 company with more than 400,000 team members worldwide, Target is an iconic brand and one of America’s leading retailers. At Target, we have a timeless purpose and a proven strategy and that hasn’t happened by accident. Some of the best minds from diverse backgrounds come together at Target to redefine retail in an inclusive learning environment that values people and delivers world-class outcomes. That winning formula is especially apparent in Bengaluru, where Target in India operates as a fully integrated part of Target’s global team and has more than 4,000 team members supporting the company’s global strategy and operations.

Target Tech Overview

Every time a guest enters a Target store or browses Target.com, they experience the impact of Target’s investments in technology and innovation. We’re the technologists behind one of the most loved retail brands, delivering joy to millions of our guests, team members, and communities.

Our global in-house technology team of more than 5,000 of engineers, data scientists, architects, coaches and product managers strive to make Target the most convenient, safe and joyful place to shop. We use agile practices and leverage open-source software to adapt and build best-in-class technology for our team members and guests—and we do so with a focus on diversity and inclusion, experimentation and continuous learning.

Pyramid Overview

Our Product Engineering teams fuel Target’s business with cutting-edge technology to deliver incredible experiences and value for guests and team members. Using a responsive architecture platform, we build and deploy industry-leading technology enabling Target to operate efficiently, securely, and reliably from the inside out. We work across Target, developing comprehensive product strategies, leveraging enterprise and guest feedback to set the standard for best in retail.

About You

As a lead engineer you would be responsible for

• Designing scalable architecture with the best choice of tech, responsible for all the services/functionalities that the team develops while ensuring quality of the team’s code and/or infrastructure standards.

• Hands‑on development, often taking on the more complicated tasks. Ensures solution is production ready, deployable, scalable and resilient.

• Planning and delivering of work in the team in addition to their own work. Promotes a learning culture through mentoring and coaching.

• Ensures product observability is in place for reliability. Fosters a culture of observability across teams and helps use operational data to improve stability and performance of their domains. Drives monitoring work on their team based on the organization’s monitoring philosophy. Is aware of the operational data for their team’s domain and uses it as a basis for driving changes to the team’s services to achieve stability and performance improvements.

• Responsible for ensuring the security of the product and fostering a security first mindset across teams. Highly skilled with applying and implementing security concepts such as identifying vulnerabilities in software, creating logic to detect malicious behavior, and analyzing network or host artifacts.

• Able to articulate a technical strategy, value of technology, and impact to the business.

• Provides guidance and cultivates solutions for the most complex problems across teams.

• Encourages team to adopt a growth mindset. Educates team about how competitors and technology companies evolve their technologies.

• Guides the team in anticipation of future use cases and helps them make design decisions that minimise the cost of future changes. Evaluates options, defines pros and cons by working with the team, and identifies the best option.

Position Overview

To succeed in this role, you’ll bring over7+ yearsof experience in software design and development, with5+ yearsfocused on building scalable backend applications. You’ll be a proven leader in guiding technical teams and driving products at scale to successful completion. Your expertise will lie in JVM‑based technologies, specifically Java and Kotlin, along with a deep understanding of building robust, scalable systems.

Must Have Skills

• Java / Kotlin (Advanced proficiency in Java/Kotlin development)

• Microservices Architecture (Designing, developing, and managing scalable microservices)

• Spring BootorMicronaut(Experience with JVM‑based frameworks, including reactive programming)

• Messaging Systems (Kafka, RabbitMQ)

• Databases (Experience with NoSQL databases like Cassandra, MongoDB, and SQL‑based databases like PostgreSQL)

• CI/CD (Building and managing pipelines with Jenkins, GitLab, or similar tools)

• Unit and Integration Testing (Spock, JUnit, TestContainers, Selenium)

• Cloud Services (AWS, GCP, Azure)

• Containerization and Orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes)

• Monitoring & Observability (Grafana, ELK Stack, Prometheus)

• Event-Driven Architecture (Knowledge of event-driven patterns in distributed systems)

Good to Have Skills

• Functional Programming(Familiarity with functional programming paradigms in Kotlin)

• GraphQL(Experience designing and integrating GraphQL APIs)

• Legacy System Modernization(Experience refactoring and modernizing older systems)

• Security Best Practices(OWASP, vulnerability scanning, secure coding principles)

• Agile Methodologies(Familiar with Scrum, Kanban, or other agile processes)

Know More About Us Here

• Life at Target- https://india.target.com/

• Benefits- https://india.target.com/life-at-target/workplace/benefits

• Follow us on social media: https://www.linkedin.com/company/target/

• Target Tech- https://tech.target.com/