Principal Software Engineer, Core Pricing

Responsibilities

• Define the long-term technical direction and roadmap for Pricing in alignment with Upstart’s business objectives.
• Lead the design and development of a system that continuously optimizes the matching of supply and demand for Upstart’s borrower-lender marketplace.
• Work closely with ML scientists to improve and develop new models that improve core business metrics.
• Guide the architectural evolution of Pricing engineering systems with an emphasis on scaling innovation across multiple engineering teams.
• Uncover and drive alignment across complex technical requirements, designs, trade-offs, influencing product direction.
• Proactively evaluate, prototype, and roll out new technologies/frameworks to help cultivate a culture of innovation.
• Lead from the front, while mentoring and developing technical leaders.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or Mathematics, or a related field (or its equivalent) + 8 years of experience.
• Experience building highly scalable systems using containerization technologies like Docker and Kubernetes.
• Experience building flexible, extensible and consistent APIs.
• Solid grasp of software development principles and best practices for creating scalable, extensible and maintainable systems.
• Proficiency in one or more object oriented programming languages like Python, Java, C#, C++.
• Strong communication skills and ability to explain complex business and technical concepts to all audiences.
• Track record of successfully mentoring and developing technical leaders.
• Experience working in dynamic fast paced organizations.
• Ability to balance the needs of the business with the needs of engineering improvements.
• Passion for clean code and architecture and initiative to “level-up” the engineering team with better practices & design.
• You are able lead and resolve company-wide technical discussions and are able to collaborate and include input from cross-functional teams (security, devops, data, compliance and product).
• You have a good sense for build-vs-buy and are able to prioritize the highest ROI architectural investments.

Nice-to-Haves

• High proficiency with Python.
• Experience with A/B testing, GRPC, and Kafka.
• Experience working in Fintech, Pricing, Ads, or ML.
• Background in statistics, mathematics, or econometrics is a big plus.
• Experience designing and building microservice-based architectures.
• Experience developing large scale distributed systems in AWS.
• Strong sense of ownership and accountability for the quality and timely delivery of work.
• Ability to thrive both in self-directed work environments and in collaborative settings, contributing positively to team dynamics.
• Demonstrated ability to take feedback well and actively incorporate it into work with a desire to continuously improve.
• Ability to influence and lead without direct authority.
• Strong product and analytical mindset that allows you to think in terms of ROI, risk, and trade offs.
• Experience working at companies that have gone through periods of rapid business or organizational growth.