Principal Software Engineer (SRE)

Make banking a Fifth Third better®

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Position Overview

Are you passionate about building resilient, scalable systems in the cloud? As a Principal Software Engineer (SRE), you’ll play a critical role in designing and implementing tools and infrastructure that support high-performing applications across our cloud environments. You’ll champion SRE best practices—maintaining and improving SLAs, SLOs, and SLIs—while driving reliability, observability, and automation at scale.

This role is ideal for engineers who thrive in agile environments, enjoy solving complex infrastructure challenges, and are committed to improving system visibility and performance. Experience in highly regulated environments is a plus, as you'll help ensure our systems meet rigorous standards for security and compliance.

GENERAL FUNCTION

As a Principal Software Engineer (SRE) within an agile squad, you will lead the design, development, and delivery of scalable software and infrastructure solutions. You will champion engineering excellence, drive architectural decisions, and mentor others through communities of practice. This role is critical in shaping the long-term technical vision and ensuring operational reliability across services.

You are accountable for identifying and managing risk, adhering to policies and procedures, and consistently acting in the best interest of customers and colleagues. You will operate within the Bank’s risk appetite while promoting a culture of transparency, compliance, and continuous improvement.

Duties And Responsibilities

• Design and implement new features that enhance product quality and reliability.
• Define and execute the long-term technical vision for applications and infrastructure.
• Serve as a technical leader and hands-on developer within an agile squad.
• Architect solutions across distributed systems and cloud-native services.
• Write clean, maintainable, and testable code aligned with engineering standards.
• Practice test-driven development and champion automation across the SDLC.
• Mentor developers, enforce coding standards, and lead code reviews.
• Drive operational excellence through observability, incident response, and service ownership.
• Collaborate with operations and engineering teams to improve service performance and availability.
• Stay current with emerging technologies and industry trends.
• Troubleshoot and resolve complex issues impacting end users or system performance.
• Create and maintain documentation for operational procedures and system configurations.
• Ensure compliance with audit and security requirements through proper controls and documentation.
• Utilize SRE-specific tools and platforms such as AWS, Terraform, Prometheus, Grafana, Kubernetes, CI/CD pipelines, and PagerDuty.
• Other duties as assigned.

SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITIES: None

Minimum Knowledge, Skills And Abilities Required

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or equivalent experience
• 8+ years of professional software engineering and/or site-reliability engineering experience
• Experience utilizing infrastructure-as-code in application and platform deployment using tools like Terraform
• Experience with observability and monitoring tools including Grafana, Prometheus, and Splunk, with a focus on improving system visibility and reliability
• Demonstrated experience with one or more programming languages (JavaScript, Python, Go, C# or equivalent)
• Demonstrated experience with cloud infrastructure, particularly AWS
• Expertise in software development best practices and agile methodologies
• Experience with RESTful APIs and distributed systems
• Proficiency with Git and GitHub workflows
• Strong grasp of security principles and secure coding practices
• Excellent problem-solving and analytical skills
• Strong collaboration and communication abilities

_Position not available for immigration sponsorship.

_Principal Software Engineer (SRE)

Total Base Pay Range 94,500.00 - 203,200.00 USD Annual

At Fifth Third, we understand the importance of recognizing our employees for the role they play in improving the lives of our customers, communities and each other. Our Total Rewards include comprehensive benefits and differentiated compensation offerings to give each employee the opportunity to be their best every day.

The base salary for this position is reflective of the range of salary levels for all roles within this pay grade across the U.S. Individual salaries within this range will vary based on factors such as role, relevant skillset, relevant experience, education and geographic location. In addition to the base salary, this role is eligible to participate in an incentive compensation plan, with any such payment based upon company, line of business and/or individual performance.

Our extensive benefits programs are designed to support the individual needs of our employees and their families, encompassing physical, financial, emotional and social well-being. You can learn more about those programs on our 53.com Careers page at: https://www.53.com/content/fifth-third/en/careers/benefits.html or by consulting with your talent acquisition partner.

LOCATION -- Virtual, Ohio 00000

Attention search firms and staffing agencies: do not submit unsolicited resumes for this posting. Fifth Third does not accept resumes from any agency that does not have an active agreement with Fifth Third. Any unsolicited resumes – no matter how they are submitted – will be considered the property of Fifth Third and Fifth Third will not be responsible for any associated fee.

Fifth Third Bank, National Association is proud to have an engaged and inclusive culture and to promote and ensure equal employment opportunity in all employment decisions regardless of race, color, gender, national origin, religion, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, military status, veteran status or any other legally protected status.