Principal Engineer, Technology Transformation & AI Enablement

CVS Health•Island, KY

1d•$144,200 - $288,400•Remote

About The Position

Aetna Technology is seeking a Principal Engineer to provide strategic technical leadership that accelerates modernization, improves engineering effectiveness, enables responsible AI adoption, and guides technology transformation across an enterprise technology portfolio. The role partners with Engineering, Enterprise Architecture, Platform Engineering, Security, Product, Infrastructure, and Delivery organizations to translate technology strategy into practical engineering execution through modernization roadmaps, technology standards, engineering best practices, and adoption of emerging technologies. The Principal Engineer will guide teams modernizing legacy systems, adopting cloud-native technologies, improving software delivery, and evaluating responsible, scalable uses of AI. The role influences technical direction across multiple platforms and business domains and works with senior technology leaders to advance consistent, sustainable outcomes. It is remote within the continental United States. The position is responsible for enterprise technology leadership; modernization and transformation; architecture and engineering enablement; AI enablement and emerging technology adoption; and technical leadership and collaboration. It includes advising engineering leaders and stakeholders, shaping modernization roadmaps and future-state architectures, defining reusable standards and patterns, supporting architecture reviews and governance, helping establish responsible AI guardrails, mentoring technical contributors, and serving as an escalation point for complex technical challenges. A bachelor's degree in a technical or related field, or an equivalent combination of education and practical experience, is required. A master's degree is preferred. The stated pay range is $144,200 to $288,400. The role is eligible for a CVS Health bonus, commission or short-term incentive program, and an equity award target. Full-time benefits include medical, dental and vision coverage, paid time off, retirement savings options, wellness programs, and other resources, based on eligibility.

Requirements

10+ years of experience in software engineering, software architecture, platform engineering, or related technical leadership roles.
5+ years of experience leading large-scale technology modernization, transformation, cloud adoption, or enterprise architecture initiatives.
Deep expertise in enterprise application architecture, software engineering practices, distributed systems, and modern software delivery methodologies.
Experience partnering with architecture and engineering organizations to drive enterprise technology strategy and execution.
Strong experience with cloud platforms, modern application architectures, and platform engineering concepts.
Experience implementing DevSecOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, engineering automation, and developer productivity solutions.
Experience evaluating and enabling AI-assisted engineering capabilities and emerging technology adoption.
Demonstrated success influencing technical decisions across large organizations without direct management authority.
Strong communication skills and ability to engage engineering teams, architects, executive stakeholders, and business leaders.
Experience mentoring senior technical contributors and technical leadership teams.
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Technology, or a related technical field, or equivalent combination of education and practical experience.

Nice To Haves

Experience in healthcare, health insurance, financial services, or another highly regulated industry.
Experience modernizing complex legacy application portfolios and supporting enterprise technology transformation initiatives.
Experience with cloud-native platforms, Kubernetes, OpenShift, containerization, infrastructure automation, and platform engineering practices.
Experience establishing engineering standards, governance models, operating frameworks, and technology adoption strategies.
Experience evaluating AI technologies, including generative AI, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), agentic workflows, model orchestration, evaluation frameworks, guardrails, monitoring, and human-in-the-loop controls.
Experience with architecture decision records (ADRs), domain-driven design, event-driven architectures, APIs, microservices, and distributed systems.
Experience developing internal engineering platforms, paved-road engineering patterns, or engineering enablement programs.
Relevant cloud, architecture, Kubernetes, DevOps, security, or AI-related certifications.
Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Technology, Business Technology, or a related discipline.

Responsibilities

Serve as a trusted technical advisor to engineering leaders, architects, product teams, and business stakeholders.
Partner with Enterprise Architecture to translate enterprise technology standards into actionable engineering guidance and implementation patterns.
Influence technology strategy, engineering practices, modernization priorities, and architectural decisions across multiple organizations.
Align long-term technology strategy with engineering execution and promote adoption of enterprise standards, architectural principles, and engineering best practices.
Lead and support modernization initiatives across enterprise applications, platforms, and services.
Develop roadmaps for application transformation, cloud adoption, platform evolution, technology simplification, and operational improvement.
Evaluate current technology landscapes and define future-state architectures that improve scalability, resiliency, maintainability, and business agility.
Guide organizations through technology transformations while balancing business objectives, delivery commitments, and technical debt reduction.
Identify opportunities to improve platform consistency, delivery speed, and engineering efficiency through reusable solutions and architectural patterns.
Define and promote engineering standards, reference architectures, implementation frameworks, and reusable technology patterns.
Partner with engineering teams to accelerate cloud-native, platform engineering, DevSecOps, and software engineering best-practice adoption.
Participate in architecture reviews, technical design discussions, and governance forums.
Guide teams in evaluating technologies, architectural approaches, modernization strategies, and platform capabilities.
Promote security, resiliency, observability, performance, maintainability, and operational excellence throughout the software development lifecycle.
Identify opportunities to use AI to improve engineering productivity, delivery efficiency, automation, and operational effectiveness.
Help establish governance frameworks, standards, and guardrails for responsible AI adoption.
Partner with architecture, engineering, security, and compliance stakeholders to evaluate emerging AI technologies and implementation approaches.
Provide technical leadership for AI-assisted software development, testing, automation, and engineering workflows.
Guide technology adoption decisions by balancing innovation, business value, security, compliance, and operational considerations.
Mentor senior engineers, architects, and technical leaders.
Lead technical communities of practice and knowledge-sharing initiatives.
Facilitate collaboration across engineering, architecture, platform, security, infrastructure, and product organizations.
Influence technical direction through expertise, leadership, and partnership rather than organizational authority.
Serve as a technical escalation point for complex architectural, modernization, and technology-related challenges.