Principal Software Engineer

Optum is a global organization that delivers care, aided by technology to help millions of people live healthier lives. The work you do with our team will directly improve health outcomes by connecting people with the care, pharmacy benefits, data and resources they need to feel their best. Here, you will find a culture guided by diversity and inclusion, talented peers, comprehensive benefits and career development opportunities. Come make an impact on the communities we serve as you help us advance health equity on a global scale. Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated Principal Software Engineer to join our team. As a Principal Engineer, you will play a crucial role in shaping the technical roadmap of our cloud-based enterprise applications. In this role, you will collaborate on upcoming features, design new solutions, lead their implementation, and ensure delivery. We foster a collaborative and inclusive team culture, adhering to the SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) methodology as our agile practice. You will excel in this organization if you are a solid communicator and practical decision maker.

As a member of the Eligibility Team…

You will be working on RESTful APIs that connect Healthcare Providers and Channel Partners to Payers. Our APIs help our customers determine if their patients are covered with the Payer, and what they are covered for. We introduce value-add capabilities into our transactional workflow that aim to improve response accuracy and quality. This functionality not only alleviates the need for Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) specialists to track Eligibility-specific intelligence offline, but it handles Payer-specific response deviations and will save our customers time and money.

Our technology at a glance

• Golang 1.23 containerized microservices, backed by OpenAPI specifications
• AWS Cloud (ECS Fargate, DynamoDB, RDS – Postgres, OpenSearch, Kinesis, SQS, EventBridge, etc.)
• Terraform and GitHub Actions

Primary Responsibilities:

• Design and develop scalable and resilient cloud-based enterprise applications and distributed microservice architecture
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams including product owners, architects, and DevOps engineers to define project requirements and deliver high-quality solutions
• Develop infrastructure as code using Terraform to provision and manage cloud resources
• Ensure system reliability, performance, and security by following industry best practices
• Write clean, maintainable, and testable code, and contribute to code reviews
• Conducts deep implementation reviews, ensuring architectural and product requirements are met, while raising the quality of the codebase
• Spearheads plans for new solutions from ambiguous asks, including the research of new technologies, defining the architectural strategy, and identifying meaningful milestones for delivery
• Creates business cases, can present the hard and soft value stories, makes base business/technical assumptions, calculates and shares ROI potential for product level initiatives
• Breaks down technical requirements for product roadmap, including system design, architectural diagrams, and API specifications
• Understands product vision and architecture well enough to effectively communicate value propositions to the Engineering team
• Coordinate and prioritize tasks, ensuring the team meets deadlines and project milestones
• Comply with the terms and conditions of the employment contract, company policies and procedures, and any and all directives (such as, but not limited to, transfer and/or re-assignment to different work locations, change in teams and/or work shifts, policies in regards to flexibility of work benefits and/or work environment, alternative work arrangements, and other decisions that may arise due to the changing business environment). The Company may adopt, vary or rescind these policies and directives in its absolute discretion and without any limitation (implied or otherwise) on its ability to do so

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field
• 15+ years of experience as an IT professional
• 8+ years of experience in any modern programming language, Java, Python, Node.JS, .NET, etc.
• 3+ years of experience in developing with Golang
• 3+ years of experience in AWS
• 3+ years of experience managing infrastructure via Terraform IaC
• 3+ years of experience architecting and designing microservices, distributed systems, and cloud-native solutions
• Solid understanding of software development best practices, including version control, testing, and continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD)
• Proficient in working with ECS Fargate, RDS Postgres, DynamoDB, and Lambda functions
• Proven ability to effectively communicate project progress, blockers, and risks to cross-functional teams and stakeholders
• Proven ability to foster a culture of open communication within the team, encouraging collaboration and information-sharing
• Proven ability to actively participate in meetings with other teams to align strategies and resolve dependencies

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field
• Relevant certifications such as AWS Certified Developer or Google Cloud Certified
• Experience with other programming languages besides Golang, such as Python, Java, or Node.js
• Experience with other cloud providers, such as Azure Cloud or Google Cloud
• Knowledge of containerization technologies like Docker and orchestration with Kubernetes
• Familiarity with SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) or other Agile methodologies
• Proven excellent problem-solving and troubleshooting skills

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone–of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income–deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes – an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.