Principal Software Engineer, Data

Credit Acceptance; United States; Remote; USD 208,000 - 307,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading company in the automotive finance sector seeks a Principal Software Engineer to drive data modeling and governance initiatives. This role involves technical leadership, collaboration across teams, and establishing best practices for data management. The ideal candidate has extensive experience in software engineering and a strong understanding of data ecosystems.

Benefits

401(K)

Adoption assistance

Parental leave

Tuition reimbursement

Medical/dental/vision

Qualifications

• Minimum 15 years of software engineering experience with a focus on data modeling and governance.
• Proven success leading data modeling and governance initiatives impacting business outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Lead technical vision and implementation strategy for data modeling and governance.
• Collaborate with data team and engineering teams on technology and architecture.

Skills

Customer Empathy

Engineering Excellence

Owner's Mindset

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science

Tools

SQL

NoSQL

Spark

Presto

Parquet

Avro

Job description

Credit Acceptance is proud to be an award-winning company with local and national workplace recognition in multiple categories! Our world-class culture is shaped by dedicated Team Members who share a drive to succeed as professionals and together as a company. A great product, amazing people, and our stable financial history have made us one of the largest used car finance companies nationally.

Our Engineering and Analytics Team Members utilize the latest technology to develop, monitor, and maintain complex practices that help optimize our success. Our Team Members value being challenged, are encouraged to express their ideas, and have the flexibility to enjoy work-life balance. We build intrinsic value by partnering with all functions of our business to support their success and make strategic business decisions. We focus on professional development and continuous improvement while enjoying a casual work environment and Great Place to Work culture!

We're seeking a Principal Software Engineer with a focus on data modeling and governance within the data engineering organization. In this role, you'll take a hands-on approach in championing data modeling and governance at the ecosystem level, role modeling how engineers should think and work. As a principal engineer, you'll be responsible for leading the technical vision, architecture, and implementation strategy for data modeling and governance across the data ecosystem. You will collaborate both within the data team and outside to ensure data success along the end-to-end lifecycle, partnering with the business in defining cohesive functional definitions of data and with engineering to define and optimize technical data models specific to systems. The ideal candidate brings 15+ years of engineering experience with significant depth in data modeling and governance. You'll serve as both a hands-on technical leader and strategic advisor, helping to establish robust, scalable foundations that enable organization-wide innovation.

Outcomes and Activities:

• This position will work from home; occasional planned travel to an assigned Southfield, Michigan office location may be required. However, this position is permitted to work at a Southfield, Michigan office location if requested by the team member.
• Provide technical thought leadership about data modeling and governance that connects and fits the business strategy and success.
• Champion cohesive data modeling and end-to-end data governance across the data portfolio for current and future success.
• Be a role model and hands-on contributor on how engineers should think and work, fostering a strong engineering culture and discipline including "show and tell" sessions.
• Collaborate with the data team and across engineering teams on technology, architecture strategy, and decision-making.
• Lead data modeling both functionally and technically by partnering with the business and engineering stakeholders, including designing cohesive functional data models, optimized database schemas, and data storage solutions tailored for consumption strategies and patterns.
• Provide technical leadership for data governance, including establishing the right frameworks, architecture, implementation, and operation along the entire data lifecycle.
• Become an expert in business processes to better support the business and align technologies with successful outcomes.
• Work with engineering leadership to develop and execute the company's technical and business strategies.
• Conduct impact analysis to identify the effects of changes across applications and systems proactively.
• Perform technical due diligence and architectural assessments of third-party technologies and solutions.
• Experiment, test ideas, validate assumptions, reach conclusions, and recommend solutions.
• Document standards, best practices, and engineering artifacts for clarity and maintainability.
• Debug critical production issues and implement effective solutions across applications/systems.
• Lead activities for continuous learning and process improvements to enhance engineering practices.
• Participate in hiring and mentoring to grow talent within the team.

Competencies:

• Customer Empathy: Understanding customer perspectives, pain points, and experiences to improve user-centric solutions.
• Engineering Excellence: Delivering high-quality craftsmanship, innovation, and best practices.
• One Team: Collaborating seamlessly across teams with shared goals and open communication.
• Owner's Mindset: Demonstrating responsibility, accountability, strategic thinking, and proactive management of your domain.

Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or equivalent work experience.
• Minimum 15 years of software engineering experience with a focus on data modeling and governance.
• Proven success leading data modeling and governance initiatives impacting business outcomes.
• Deep understanding of business processes, translating them into functional data models.
• Extensive experience with structured/unstructured data, schema vs. schema-less, batch vs. real-time, data lake tech, SQL/NoSQL, streaming, data formats (Parquet, ORC, Avro), query engines (Spark, Presto, SQL).
• Expertise in metadata management, data catalogues, lineage, quality, observability for big data and real-time workflows.
• Ability to decompose large problems into manageable tasks for continuous delivery.
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, cloud, microservices.
• Experience with enterprise mission-critical applications.
• Ability to collaborate with business partners and mentor team members.
• Experience building big data real-time production systems that deliver business value.
• Familiarity with Agile delivery methodologies.

Preferred:

• Financial services or FinTech industry experience.

Knowledge and Skills:

• Architecture and Design: Implementing solutions that meet business and customer needs, fostering growth and innovation.
• Leadership: Mentoring, influencing change, driving business outcomes.
• Challenging the status quo and influencing stakeholders.
• Fostering collaboration and diversity of thought.
• Building strong organizational relationships.
• Staying current with emerging technologies, coaching, embedding learning and innovation.
• Connecting technical work to business value clearly.
• Communicating complex technical info effectively to all levels.
• Working independently and in teams in dynamic environments.

Target Compensation: $208,761 - $306,183. This position is eligible for an annual bonus of 20-60%, influenced by skills, experience, industry, education, and certifications. Candidates in major metro areas (SF, Seattle, Boston, NYC, LA, SD) may qualify for a premium.

Benefits:

• Comprehensive benefits including 401(K), adoption assistance, parental leave, tuition reimbursement, medical/dental/vision, and more.

Our Values:

• Positivity, respect, insightfulness, directness, and earnestness are key traits for success.

Expectations:

• Compliance with policies, attendance, and other duties.

Advice: We encourage you to apply if exploring new opportunities; we value long-term fit.

P.S. We’re proud of our culture and success, and look forward to sharing more!

Required degrees must be from accredited institutions or equivalent.

Credit Acceptance is committed to diversity and equal opportunity employment. We welcome all qualified applicants regardless of age, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or other protected characteristics.

California Residents: Please review our CCPA notice regarding personal information collection.

Learn more about our culture by watching the video below.