Director, Principal Software Engineer - Strategic Engineering

Pfizer • New York City, CT

3d • Hybrid

About The Position

Pfizer’s digital and ‘data first’ strategy is dedicated to implementing innovative and impactful technology solutions across all functions, from research to manufacturing. Whether you are digitizing drug discovery and development, identifying solutions, or making our work easier and faster, you will be making a significant difference to countless lives. By focusing on these advancements, you contribute to a future where technology enhances every aspect of our operations, ultimately benefiting patients worldwide. In this role, you will focus on code quality, architecture decisions, and reliable delivery while leveraging AI tools to enhance productivity. You will verify and review AI-generated code to ensure it meets our quality standards. You will be bridging the gap between building products and solving real business problems through rapid solution delivery and deep domain expertise. As part of the discovery-to-scale pipeline, you will identify recurring patterns, and lead validated solutions generalization into enterprise capabilities. This role encompasses organization-wide technical strategy and architectural direction. You will define strategic direction and be accountable for outcomes, shape organizational practices and maintain external industry visibility. You will handle organizational-scale complexity creating clarity from chaos.

Requirements

• Applicant must have a bachelor's degree, in Computer Science, Engineering or related field preferred, with at least 8 years of experience; OR a master's degree with at least 7 years of experience; OR a PhD with 5+ years of experience
• Demonstrated track record of having personally created applications that are actively used with senior leadership (ELT / ELT-1), with the ability to present complex technical solutions to executive audiences
• Candidate demonstrates a breadth of diverse leadership experiences and capabilities including: the ability to influence and collaborate with peers, develop and coach others, oversee and guide the work of other colleagues to achieve meaningful outcomes and create business impact.
• Candidates must be authorized to be employed in the U.S. by any employer.
• U.S. work visa sponsorship (such as TN, O-1, H-1B, etc.) is not available for this role now or in the future.

Nice To Haves

• Shapes organizational culture around curiosity and continuous learning; sponsors experimental initiatives across the organization; recognized externally as a thought leader in problem discovery; influences industry practices around innovation and exploration
• Defines organizational accountability standards focused on business impact; shapes industry practices around outcome ownership in the AI era; sponsors transformational initiatives with full outcome accountability; recognized externally for ownership culture leadership
• Champions cross-disciplinary learning; creates holistic solutions spanning technical and business domains; embodies the Renaissance Developer ideal; translates specialized knowledge into accessible explanations; thinks like a business insider
• Creates spec-driven development practices; mentors others on precise communication; spans C-level executives to frontline workers; drives clarity as a core value across their function; represents the organization externally
• Shapes systems design practices across their function; conducts chaos engineering experiments; influences cross-team architecture decisions; creates clarity from complexity; bridges technical systems with business processes
• You are a recognized thought leader. You influence strategy across the business, exemplify the business immersion mindset that defines engineering, and shape how engineering engages with the business.
• You define data integration patterns and best practices. You architect large-scale data flows, solve the most complex integration challenges, and are the authority on enterprise data integration.
• You work comfortably in any language and rapidly acquire new skills as needed. You deliver production solutions in days not months, shape full-stack practices and exemplify polymathic engineering.
• You shape communication practices. You represent engineering externally, communicate at board and executive level, and are recognized as an exceptional communicator who bridges any audience gap.
• You shape approaches to problem discovery. You are recognized for transforming ambiguous situations into clear opportunities, influence how teams engage with business problems, and are the go-to person for the most undefined challenges.
• You shape culture around rapid validation and iterative delivery. You are recognized for transformative fast delivery, define standards for prototype-to-production, and exemplify the "deliver in days" mindset.
• You shape stakeholder practices. You manage executive relationships, represent engineering at the highest levels, and are recognized for exceptional stakeholder partnerships.
• You create collaborative culture. You transform dysfunctional team dynamics, are recognized for building exceptional teams, and mentor others on collaboration excellence.
• You lead AI governance initiatives across teams in your area, create evaluation standards and checklists, and train engineers on rigorous AI verification. You design review processes for AI-assisted work.
• You guide AI adoption decisions across teams in your area, assess AI risks and benefits systematically, and train engineers on responsible AI usage. You design human-in-the-loop workflows.
• You optimize AI tool usage across teams in your area, train engineers on AI-augmented workflows, evaluate new AI development tools, and establish practices that balance AI speed with verification rigor.
• You design complex multi-component systems end-to-end, evaluate architectural options for large initiatives across teams, guide technical decisions for your area, and mentor engineers on architecture. You balance elegance with delivery needs.
• You establish and enforce quality standards across teams in your area. You mentor engineers on effective code review, ensure verification depth for AI-assisted development, and drive testing strategies.
• You lead developer experience initiatives across teams in your area. You design comprehensive self-service platforms, establish DX metrics, conduct systematic user research, and mentor engineers on platform-as-product thinking.
• You lead knowledge management initiatives across teams in your area, create knowledge systems and taxonomies, establish practices that make institutional knowledge persistent, and mentor others on knowledge sharing.
• You lead pattern generalization initiatives across teams, define criteria for when to generalize vs keep custom. You mentor engineers on abstraction design.
• You lead service management practices for multiple services across teams, optimize service portfolios for your area, balance service investments, and train engineers on service-oriented thinking.
• You define reliability standards across teams in your area, drive post-incident improvements systematically, design capacity planning processes, and mentor engineers on SRE practices.
• You define documentation standards across teams in your area, create documentation systems and templates, train engineers on spec-driven development, and ensure documentation quality across projects.
• You design cloud-native solutions, manage infrastructure as code, implement security best practices, and make informed service selections. You troubleshoot cloud-specific issues.
• You create efficient data models that balance normalization with query performance. You optimize queries, handle schema migrations safely, and choose appropriate storage technologies.
• You build complete CI/CD pipelines end-to-end, manage infrastructure as code (Terraform, CloudFormation), implement monitoring, and design deployment strategies for your services.
• You optimize team processes systematically, measure and improve cycle time, remove bottlenecks proactively, and deliver rapidly while maintaining quality.
• You prioritize debt systematically based on risk and impact, balance debt reduction with feature work, and make pragmatic trade-offs. You know when to take on debt intentionally.
• You protect focused time for complex work, balance multiple priorities without dropping balls, minimize context switching, and help others understand your capacity.

Responsibilities

• Lead a forward-deployed pod of engineers and product owners responsible for creating quick, high-quality applications supporting ELT and ELT-1 initiatives
• Drive delivery of the most critical technical initiatives, establish engineering delivery practices across the team, and be the technical authority on high-stakes projects
• Develop technical leaders, shape engineering talent strategy, and build high-performing engineering teams
• Shape technology-driven strategy, represent technical perspective at executive level, and be recognized as a bridge between engineering and business
• Design AI-augmented engineering workflows for your area, evaluate new AI tools, train engineers on effective AI usage, and balance speed with verification
• Establish SLOs/SLIs across teams, build resilient systems, lead reliability initiatives for your area, mentor engineers on reliability practices, and drive reliability culture
• Establish documentation standards across teams in your area, build knowledge management systems, and mentor engineers on effective technical writing
• Drive process efficiency within your team, coordinate cross-functional technical work, and lead retrospectives
• Present complex technical solutions to senior leadership and executive audiences in a clear, compelling way
• Participate as a leader in guild events and serve as an active leader in the mentorship program

Benefits

• 401(k) plan with Pfizer Matching Contributions and an additional Pfizer Retirement Savings Contribution
• paid vacation, holiday and personal days
• paid caregiver/parental and medical leave
• health benefits to include medical, prescription drug, dental and vision coverage
• Relocation assistance may be available based on business needs and/or eligibility.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal