As a principal engineer on Walmart’s Digital Out of Home platform team, you will set technical direction for core backend systems, including Kafka-based data ingestion pipelines and real-time decisioning services. You’ll design scalable service architectures in Kubernetes, ensuring reliability and observability as the system scales across 4,000 retail locations. Responsibilities include owning foundational data decisions, driving performance at scale, leading architecture reviews, mentoring senior engineers, and partnering with product stakeholders to translate business goals into technical solutions. Ideal candidates have over a decade of experience building large-scale backend systems, hands-on expertise in distributed architectures, containerized services on Kubernetes, and streaming systems. Proficiency in SQL and NoSQL databases for schema design and data management is essential, along with strong mentoring skills and excellent communication abilities to influence architectural decisions across teams.
Set technical direction for core backend systems including Kafka-based ingestion pipelines and real-time decisioning services.
Design scalable service architectures in Kubernetes, ensuring reliability and ease of operation as complexity grows.
Own foundational data decisions, including schema design and access patterns across SQL and NoSQL databases.
Drive reliability and performance at scale, addressing failure modes in systems operating continuously across 4,000+ retail locations.
Lead architecture and design reviews, guiding teams through complex tradeoffs around latency, consistency, scalability, and operational risk.
What we're looking for
10+ years of experience building and operating large-scale backend systems in production.
Strong background in designing distributed architectures for real-time, high-availability systems.
Hands-on experience with containerized services and Kubernetes deployments.
Proven expertise in developing backend streaming systems using event-driven or message-based architectures.
Deep knowledge of SQL and NoSQL databases for data modeling, schema design, and performance optimization.
Demonstrated ability to mentor senior engineers and lead technical discussions across teams.
Excellent communication skills to articulate complex concepts and influence architectural decisions.
Market check
Salary context
This
$143,000–$286,000
range sits above
84%
of similar postings on FindRole.
Peer median band
$143,000–$234,850
Median floor and ceiling across peers.
Typical midpoint (25–75%)
$165,000–$214,500
Middle half of comparable postings.
Based on 240 comparable postings.*
* 240 is the maximum number of comparable postings sampled.
Employer
About Walmart
Walmart Inc. is the world''s largest retailer by revenue, operating a chain of hypermarkets, discount department stores, and grocery stores, as well as a growing e-commerce presence through Walmart.com. Industry: General Merchandise & Grocery Retail
Walmart currently has
495 open roles
on FindRole.
Listed pay typically runs
$117,000–$234,000
across 487 roles with salary data.