Technical Lead Payments (Staff Software Engineer)

TITLE: Technical Lead/Staff Software Engineer Payments (Credit Card Lead Developer)
LOCATION(S): New York, NY 10017 or Southlake, TX 76092 or California (open for discussion)
IN OFFICE POLICY IF LOCAL TO NY or TX location: If local, 4 days a week onsite. If not local, arrangements for 2-3 days a week in office, or possibly remote for a perfect candidate.
SALARY RANGES: DOE
HIERARCHY/REPORT TO: Director of Engineering and Partner
SIZES OF STAFF TO MANAGE: none at first, but proven experience mentoring and building a development team
SIZES OF TEAMS: TBD
EDUCATION/ DEGREES/ CERTIFICATIONS REQUIRED: Bachelors
INDUSTRY: Fintech, Banking, Financial Services Platforms, Start-ups
PRIVATE COMPANY
# of EMPLOYEES: <200 and growing

REQUIREMENTS:
Hands-on technical leadership (experience mentoring and building development teams)
5+ years backend engineering experience (production systems)
Background in fintech, banking, or financial services platforms.
Strong expertise in .NET / C#
Strong hands-on expertise in Azure SQL
Deep experience running systems in Microsoft Azure (production environment)
Proven ability to work in a product-driven environment and deliver outcomes (not just code)
Demonstrated AI-first mindset (automation, AI-assisted workflows, LLM integration exposure is a plus)

Strong fundamentals in:
Distributed systems
Microservices architecture
API design
Transactional data systems
System design and data modeling

Preferred
Front-end development experience with Angular expertise
Experience with payments (Domestic, Cross border payments), credit card issuance, or virtual card Payment.
Familiarity with PCI DSS concepts, tokenization, and payment security practices.
Experience supporting high-volume, financial transaction systems.
Experience with event-driven systems, queues/pub-sub

Role Summary
This role is a hands-on technical lead position requiring deep expertise in .NET and Microsoft Azure. The engineer is expected to design, implement, review, and deliver core backend services that must be robust, secure, and scalable.
We re looking for a Staff Software Engineer to lead the design and delivery of payment rails across:
Bank Integrations (ACH, Wire, RTP, check services, cross-border payments and balance/transaction reporting)
Virtual Card Payments (STP /single-use / multi-use, authorization/ capture/ clearing/ settlement flows)
T&E Cards (corporate card programs, card controls, near-real-time expense signals)
The role carries technical ownership and decision-making responsibility for system architecture, reliability, and performance.
The primary requirement is the ability to build and scale complex backend systems, apply strong cloud and security fundamentals, and take end-to-end responsibility for production-quality engineering outcomes.
This role sits at the intersection of core engineering, security, fintech integration, and product execution.

Key Outcomes (What this role delivers)
Scalable, fault-tolerant backend services built in .NET
Cloud-native production systems on Azure with strong observability
Payment and transactional workflows that are idempotent, auditable, and correct
Improved platform reliability, performance, and long-term scalability
Higher engineering standards through strong reviews, mentorship, and architecture leadership

Core Responsibilities
Set technical directions, lead code/design reviews, mentor engineers, and build core services
Design and own backend architecture (scalability, reliability, security, cost trade-offs)
Collaborate with the product team to define and own the product roadmap
Build, review, and deliver production-grade .NET services end-to-end
Operate services in Azure with high operational maturity (logging, metrics, alerts, incident response)
Identify and resolve bottlenecks and failure modes proactively
Ensure correctness of transactional and financial data; apply secure coding practices
Lead code/design reviews and mentor engineers; raise overall backend capability
Collaborate with onboarding and support teams to make sure the product meets delivery and support standards

What You Need
Track record of shipping scalable high-quality products and features
5+ years of experience in architecting and building distributed systems using .Net/C# and Azure cloud
Solid engineering craft: automated testing, code reviews, CI/CD, and observability.
Desire to work in a fast-paced environment

Nice to Have:
Payment domain experience