Staff Software Engineer

Visa•Austin, TX

5d•$133,300 - $213,400•Onsite

About The Position

Visa is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to design, implement, and improve software applications and systems. The role is hands-on, with approximately 60–75% of time spent coding, and uses modern tools—including AI-assisted development, cloud services, and automation frameworks—to deliver secure, scalable, high-quality technology solutions in fintech. The engineer works with product managers, designers, data scientists, QA, operations, compliance, and other stakeholders to turn business requirements into technical solutions while following best practices, security standards, and regulatory requirements. Digital fluency is required, including the use of emerging technologies such as generative AI tools in everyday work. The position requires at least three days in the office; the Hiring Manager will confirm expectations for those days. Work hours vary according to department needs, and travel is required 5–10% of the time. The position is performed in an office setting and includes sitting and standing at a desk, communicating in person and by telephone, and frequent use of standard office equipment such as telephones and computers.

Requirements

At least 5 years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor's Degree, at least 2 years with an Advanced Degree, no experience required with a PhD, or at least 8 years of relevant work experience.
Experience in software engineering or a directly related field.
Experience developing and/or implementing web-based or mobile applications.
Experience in a leadership role, with or without direct reports.
Experience with technologies/software systems or a directly related field.
Experience creating and maintaining test plans and executing testing procedures.
Experience debugging and troubleshooting software issues.
Experience collaborating with cross-functional teams to deliver technical solutions.
Experience conducting code reviews and applying coding standards.
Experience building or enhancing developer tools.
Practical exposure to AI/ML or GenAI solutions, including the ability to assess use cases, integration approaches, limitations, risks, and production readiness.
Advanced Java proficiency, including core Java, concurrency, collections, JVM fundamentals, performance tuning, and modern language features.
Strong backend engineering experience with Spring Boot, Spring Framework, JPA/Hibernate, REST APIs, microservices, and distributed systems.
Knowledge of modern web development using Angular or React, TypeScript, JavaScript, HTML5, CSS3, responsive design, component-based architecture, state management, accessibility, and secure REST API integration.
Strong knowledge of relational databases, SQL, data modeling, schema design, indexing, query optimization, transactions, and performance tuning; working experience with NoSQL databases, caching, and Java data-access frameworks such as JPA/Hibernate.
Experience with relational and NoSQL databases, caching, and messaging platforms such as Kafka or NATS.
Hands-on experience with Docker, Kubernetes, Linux, infrastructure environments, and CI/CD tools such as Maven, Gradle, Jenkins, or equivalent platforms.
Knowledge of secure coding, OAuth 2.0, OIDC, API security, secrets management, vulnerability remediation, and enterprise security standards.
Experience with application logging, metrics, tracing, alerting, and tools such as Splunk, Prometheus, Grafana, or OpenTelemetry.
Strong experience with JUnit, Mockito, automated integration testing, code-quality tools, and test-driven development.
Good understanding of LLMs, prompt engineering, embeddings, vector databases, RAG, model APIs, AI agents, evaluation, and responsible-AI practices.
Ability to integrate AI services through APIs or SDKs.

Nice To Haves

Six or more years of work experience with a Bachelor's Degree, four or more years of relevant experience with an Advanced Degree, or up to three years of relevant experience with a PhD.
Experience building high-volume, highly available, consumer- or client-facing platforms.
Hands-on exposure to public cloud platforms and managed AI services.
Experience prototyping or delivering RAG, semantic search, conversational AI, or agentic workflow solutions.
Knowledge of model evaluation, hallucination mitigation, AI observability, token and infrastructure cost management, and privacy controls.
Experience mentoring engineers and influencing technical direction across multiple teams.
Familiarity with AI integration frameworks such as Spring AI, LangChain4j, LangChain, or equivalent.

Responsibilities

Collaborate with stakeholders to determine product component requirements and incorporate feedback into future designs or solutions.
Translate functional requirements into system designs, communicate component interactions, and align solutions with business needs and timelines.
Design and develop product components, refine code plans, and lead design reviews to ensure completeness and adherence to requirements.
Contribute to project estimates, consider delivery costs, and escalate issues that may cause delays.
Create, implement, and maintain extensible, reusable code; drive code quality using metrics and best practices.
Use debugging tools to resolve moderately complex issues and identify opportunities to automate products.
Lead code reviews, enforce coding standards, and provide feedback to team members.
Create complex test plans, identify test gaps, and proactively address defects to minimize customer impact.
Use data analysis and monitoring standards to identify patterns and defects across environments.
Respond to incidents during on-call rotations, troubleshoot complex issues, and assist with incident response and resolution.
Build, enhance, and identify developer tools to support programs and applications.
Seek new knowledge, adapt to technical trends and solutions to improve product performance, and recommend resources to other engineers.