Principal Engineer - VP Level

Role Overview NatWest Group is looking for a Principal Engineer at the Vice President level to join its Engineering Centre of Excellence in Chennai. This is a senior, high-impact role where you will architect and deliver modern, cloud-native, and resilient platforms with a focus on customer experience, enterprise scalability, and engineering excellence. You will play a pivotal role in shaping the bank's next-generation technology landscape while guiding high-performing engineering teams through complex transformation programs. Key Responsibilities - Architect and deliver innovative engineering solutions for complex business challenges, ensuring platforms are secure, scalable, and cloud-ready - Lead the design of microservices, event-driven systems, BPMN workflows, and distributed platforms with a strong focus on resilience and scalability - Define and maintain architectural roadmaps, engineering standards, reusable components, and reference implementations - Drive legacy modernisation by transforming monolithic systems into cloud-native solutions and leading migrations across IaaS, PaaS, and CaaS environments - Provide end-to-end technical governance across design, development, testing, security, performance, and release management - Oversee the productivity of software engineering teams and ensure consistent adoption of shared platform components and technologies - Lead senior stakeholder engagements and propose appropriate technical solutions to meet product and business objectives - Champion engineering excellence through automation, CI/CD pipelines, observability, performance tuning, and production readiness - Mentor and develop engineers, track delivery progress, and continuously improve team capability and platform reliability Required Qualifications - Minimum 12 years of hands-on experience in Java, Spring Boot, microservices architecture, and cloud-native application development - Proven expertise with AWS, Kubernetes, Docker, PaaS, and CaaS platforms - Strong experience with Camunda BPMN, event-driven systems, REST and SOAP APIs, and IAM technologies including Ping, TYK, and JWKS - Solid data engineering skills across SQL and NoSQL databases such as Oracle, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, and DB2 - Demonstrated technical architecture leadership across large-scale enterprise programs including cloud migration and distributed system design - Proficiency in DevOps practices including CI/CD, TDD, Mockito, code quality tools, and release management - Experience with observability and monitoring tools such as Splunk and APM solutions - Knowledge of Financial Crime domains including SAR, case management, and workflows is an advantage - Strong leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills Why Join Us NatWest Group offers you a platform to lead meaningful technology transformation at one of the world's most recognised banking institutions, with significant visibility at the senior leadership level. This is your opportunity to influence enterprise architecture decisions, build high-performing engineering teams, and drive real impact across the bank's technology ecosystem.

- 13 or more years of experience in software engineering and solution architecture - Deep expertise in Java, Spring Boot, and microservices architecture - Hands-on experience with AWS, Kubernetes, Docker, PaaS, and CaaS platforms - Strong knowledge of Camunda BPMN and event-driven architecture - Experience with REST and SOAP APIs and enterprise integration patterns - Familiarity with IAM technologies including Ping, TYK, and JWKS - Proficiency in SQL and NoSQL databases including Oracle, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, and DB2 - Expertise in DevOps, CI/CD pipelines, TDD, and automated testing frameworks - Experience with observability tools such as Splunk and APM - Proven track record of leading cloud migration and legacy modernisation programs - Strong leadership and senior stakeholder engagement skills - Knowledge of Financial Crime workflows such as SAR and case management is a plus

- Senior VP-level role with significant leadership exposure - Opportunity to shape enterprise-wide technology transformation - Engagement with internal and industry-wide engineering events and conferences - Work within a globally recognised banking and financial services organisation - Collaborative environment with high-performing engineering teams