Principal Software Engineer

Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc.; Rockville (MD); Hybrid; USD 154,000 - 300,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

401(k) plan with company match

Tuition reimbursement

Commuter benefits

Wellness programs

Paid holidays

Volunteer service days

Job summary

FINRA seeks a highly experienced technologist to design and deliver enterprise-grade document processing systems. You will architect scalable pipelines for unstructured data, spanning extraction, NLP, metadata enrichment, and storage across relational, NoSQL, and graph databases.

You will own backend development in modern Java, Spring Boot, RESTful/GraphQL APIs, and microservices, with strong DevOps and cloud expertise in AWS. Hybrid work and long-term impact on regulatory tech are expected.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related discipline with at least ten (10) years of related experience, or equivalent training and/or work experience or Master’s degree and eight (8) years of related experience.
• Mastery level system design experience
• Mastery level experience in object-oriented development
• Mastery level experience with cloud technologies
• Strong experience in data storage technologies
• Strong background in performance tuning and optimization
• Strong background in DevOps and CI/CD technologies
• Strong background in test automation and unit testing
• Strong background in software security

Responsibilities

• Design and develop industry-leading solutions that meet defined quality standards and reliability specifications.
• Architect scalable, enterprise-grade document ingestion, processing, and persistence at scale.
• Lead backend development across API layers, data persistence, and microservices.
• Implement cloud-native solutions on AWS (Lambda, Step Functions, SQS, SNS, S3, ECS, Fargate, Aurora).
• Ensure robust data storage using relational, NoSQL, and graph databases.
• Guide DevOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, and secure software delivery.

Skills

Unstructured data processing

Document processing pipelines

Backend development

Java frameworks

Spring Boot

RESTful APIs

GraphQL APIs

Microservices

Event-driven systems

Cloud AWS

OCR/NLP

Data modeling

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related

Master's degree in Computer Science

Tools

AWS

Relational DB

NoSQL databases

Graph databases

OCR

Job description

Works autonomously having responsibility to deliver on longer term outcomes. Reports directly to a Director or Senior Director. Requires extensive knowledge of multiple/related functional areas and industry practices.

Essential Job Functions:

Has specialized depth and/or breadth in unstructured document processing, and system design and architecture and is considered a company-level expert. Designs and develops industry-leading solutions that meet defined quality standards, reliability specifications, and help achieve key strategic objectives. Mastery in computer science fundamentals - Algorithm design, Problem solving, Complexity analysis and data structures. Requires deep technical fluency in modern Java frameworks, microservices architectures, and event-driven systems, with experience across the full stack from API layer through data persistence to inform architectural decisions, and design and develop software components.

Expertise in comprehensive data storage strategies across relational databases, NoSQL systems, and/or graph databases. Unstructured data processing: Deep expertise designing and building large-scale, high-throughput pipelines that ingest, extract, parse, classify, and normalize content from diverse unstructured and semi-structured sources (Example: PDF, Word, HTML, scanned images), applying techniques such as OCR, document layout analysis, text extraction, entity recognition, and metadata enrichment, leveraging NLP/ML frameworks and cloud-native services to transform raw documents into structured, queryable data.

Backend Development: Experience in backend development across server-side technologies and architectures. Ability to design and implement scalable, high-performance systems from API layer to data persistence, with deep understanding of modern frameworks (Spring Boot), RESTful and GraphQL APIs, microservices architectures, event-driven architectures, and database design patterns.

Data Storage Technologies: Experience with modern data storage solutions including relational databases, NoSQL systems, and/or graph databases with expertise in data modeling approaches and design patterns for diverse data persistence requirements.

System Design & Architecture: System design experience with ability to architect scalable, enterprise-grade document and metadata ingestion, processing, and persistence at scale DevOps & Infrastructure: Implement and maintain CI/CD pipelines while architecting and developing cloud-native solutions leveraging AWS services, including Lambda, Step functions, SQS, SNS, S3, ECS, Fargate, Aurora, fostering a strong DevOps culture within the team.

Education/Experience Requirements:

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems or related discipline with at least ten (10) years of related experience, or equivalent training and/or work experience or Master’s degree and eight (8) years of related experience. Mastery level system design experience Mastery level experience in object-oriented development Mastery level experience with cloud technologies Strong experience in data storage technologies Strong background in performance tuning and optimization Strong background in DevOps and CI\CD technologies Strong background in test automation and unit testing Strong background in software security

Working Conditions:

Hybrid work environment, with defined in-person presence requirements. Occasional travel and extended hours may be required. For work that is performed in CO, FL, TX, IL, PA, MA, MD, VA, Washington, DC, NY and NJ, please refer to the chart below for the salary range for the corresponding location. FINRA complies with all state and local pay transparency laws and regulations requiring the disclosure of salary ranges for the position. In addition to location, actual compensation is based on various factors, including but not limited to, the candidate’s skill set, level of experience, education, and market considerations. CO/FL/TX: Minimum Salary $134,400, Maximum Salary $260,400 IL/PA: Minimum Salary $147,600, Maximum Salary $286,500 MA/MD/VA/Washington, DC: Minimum Salary $154,400, Maximum Salary $299,600 NY/NJ: Minimum Salary $154,400, Maximum Salary $312,600 #LI-Hybrid

Employees may be eligible for a discretionary bonus in addition to base pay. Non-exempt employees are also eligible for overtime pay in accordance with federal, state, or local law.

As part of its dedication to employee wellness, FINRA provides comprehensive health, dental and vision insurance. Additional insurance includes basic life, accidental death and dismemberment, supplemental life, spouse/domestic partner and dependent life, and spouse/domestic partner and dependent accidental death and dismemberment, short- and long-term disability, long-term care, business travel accident, disability and legal.

FINRA offers immediate participation and vesting in a 401(k) plan with company match and eligibility for participation in an additional FINRA-funded retirement contribution, tuition reimbursement, commuter benefits, and other benefits that support employee wellness, such as adoption assistance, backup family care, surrogacy benefits, employee assistance, and wellness programs.

Time Off and Paid Leave* FINRA encourages its employees to focus on their health and wellness in many ways, including through a generous time-off program starting at 15 days of paid time off (increasing with years of service, up to 25 days), 5 personal days, and 9 sick days, unless otherwise required by law (all pro-rated in the first year). Additionally, we are proud to support our communities by providing two volunteer service days (based on full-time schedule). Other paid leave includes military leave, jury duty leave, bereavement leave, voting and election official leave for federal, state or local primary and general elections, care of a family member leave (available after 90 days of employment); and childbirth and parental leave (available after 90 days of employment). Full-time employees receive nine paid holidays. *Based on full-time schedule

Important Information FINRA’s Code of Conduct imposes restrictions on employees’ investments and requires financial disclosures that are uniquely related to our role as a securities regulator. FINRA employees are required to disclose to FINRA all brokerage accounts that they maintain, and those in which they control trading or have a financial interest (including any trust account of which they are a trustee or beneficiary and all accounts of a spouse, domestic partner or minor child who lives with the employee) and to authorize their broker-dealers to provide FINRA with duplicate statements for all of those accounts. All of those accounts are subject to the Code’s investment and securities account restrictions, and new employees must comply with those investment restrictions—including disposing of any security issued by a company on FINRA’s Prohibited Company List or obtaining a written waiver from their Executive Vice President—by the date they begin employment with FINRA.

As standard practice, employees must also execute FINRA’s Employee Confidentiality and Invention Assignment Agreement without qualification or modification and comply with the company’s policy on nepotism.

FINRA is an Equal Opportunity Employer All qualified applicants receive consideration for employment without regard to any legally protected category, including race, color, age, national origin, ethnicity, religion, disability, genetic information, military or veteran status, sex, or any other status or classification protected by state or local law. FINRA strives to make our career site accessible to all users. If you need a disability-related accommodation for completing the application process, please contact FINRA’s Employee Relations team at 240-386-4865 or by email at [e-mail]. Please note that this process is exclusively for inquiries regarding accommodations in the application process. FINRA abides by the requirements of 41 CFR 60-741.5(a). This regulation prohibits discrimination against qualified individuals on the basis of disability and requires affirmative action by covered prime contractors and subcontractors to employ and advance in employment qualified individuals with disabilities. FINRA abides by the requirements of 41 CFR 60-300.5(a). This regulation prohibits discrimination against qualified protected veterans and requires affirmative action by covered prime contractors and subcontractors to employ and advance in employment qualified protected veterans.

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