Principal Engineer, Streaming & Metadata Governance

IBM Computing; Seattle (WA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

IBM Software seeks a Principal Engineer to lead the architecture and delivery of governance systems for Confluent's streaming platform, shaping schema management and data policies at scale. You will own company-level domains, drive initiatives, and influence engineering practices and product strategy while ensuring reliability and scalability across Confluent Cloud and Platform.

You will mentor senior engineers, collaborate with executives, and contribute to external leadership through talks and

Qualifications

• Proven track record of leading architecture of large-scale distributed systems.
• Deep knowledge of fault tolerance, consistency, scalability, and cloud-native platforms.
• Experience with streaming or event-driven architectures and related metadata/governance systems.
• Ability to navigate ambiguity and influence across teams.
• Strong execution and delivery bias; ships outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Define and drive company-level technical strategy for governance systems.
• Architect metadata management with low latency and strong consistency.
• Design data protection capabilities including encryption and access control.
• Build and maintain multi-tenant, scalable governance infrastructure.
• Establish engineering standards and patterns across the org.
• Collaborate with executives and product teams to align vision.
• Mentor senior engineers and foster open-source contributions.
• Represent Confluent externally through talks and leadership.

Skills

Distributed systems leadership

Distributed systems mastery

Streaming architecture

Strategic influence

Leadership presence

Delivery execution

Job description

IBM Software seeks a Principal Engineer to lead the architecture and delivery of governance systems for Confluent's streaming platform, shaping schema management and data policies at scale. You will own company-level domains, drive initiatives, and influence engineering practices and product strategy while ensuring reliability and scalability across Confluent Cloud and Platform.

You will mentor senior engineers, collaborate with executives, and contribute to external leadership through talks and