Lead Software Engineer - Cloud Native Platforms (GCP)

About UsVisa is a world leader in payments technology, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across more than 200 countries and territories, dedicated to uplifting everyone, everywhere by being the best way to pay and be paid.At Visa, you'll have the opportunity to create impact at scale — tackling meaningful challenges, growing your skills and seeing your contributions impact lives around the world.Join Visa and do work that matters – to you, to your community, and to the world. Progress starts with you.Job DescriptionWe are seeking a highly experienced Lead Software Engineer to design, build, and operate secure, scalable, high-performance, and highly available cloud-native platforms on Google Cloud Platform (GCP). This role is ideal for a hands-on technical leader who can drive software engineering excellence across application development, distributed systems, cloud infrastructure, reliability engineering, performance optimization, and production operations.As a Lead Software Engineer, you will be responsible for delivering mission-critical services that support high transaction volumes, demanding availability requirements, and global-scale business operations. You will partner with Product, Architecture, Security, SRE, DevOps, and Engineering teams to build resilient and performant systems while mentoring engineers and elevating engineering standards across the organization. The role requires deep technical expertise, strong ownership, and the ability to deliver production-ready solutions in complex, high-scale environments.Key ResponsibilitiesDesign, develop, test, deploy, and operate scalable, secure, and highly available software solutions.Build cloud-native applications and services on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) leveraging Kubernetes (GKE), containerization, CI/CD pipelines, observability, and infrastructure automation.Design and implement distributed systems capable of supporting high transaction volumes with strict latency and availability requirements.Drive performance engineering initiatives including throughput optimization, latency reduction, capacity planning, application profiling, and scalability improvements.Design, implement, and support modern deployment strategies including Canary Deployments, Blue-Green Deployments, feature flags, and automated rollback mechanisms.Translate business requirements into extensible, resilient, and maintainable technical solutions.Lead architecture discussions, design reviews, and technical decision-making processes.Develop high-quality code while enforcing engineering best practices including secure coding, automated testing, code reviews, and operational readiness.Troubleshoot complex production issues, perform root-cause analysis, and drive long-term reliability improvements.Improve platform reliability, scalability, security, observability, and operational efficiency through automation and continuous improvement.Collaborate with Product, Architecture, Security, SRE, DevOps, and other cross-functional teams to deliver enterprise-grade solutions.Mentor engineers and contribute to a strong engineering culture focused on ownership, innovation, and continuous learning.Leverage agentic workflows to improve developer productivity, code quality, testing effectiveness, and operational efficiency.Visa requires at least 3 days in office, expectations of these days will be confirmed by your Hiring Manager.QualificationsBasic Qualifications:10+ years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor’s Degree or at least 7 years of work experience with an Advanced degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD) or 4 years of work experience with a PhD, OR 13+ years of relevant work experience.Preferred Qualifications:12+ years of software engineering experience in enterprise, fintech, payments, or highly regulated environments.Strong hands-on experience with Google Cloud Platform (GCP), including GKE, Cloud Monitoring, Cloud Logging, cloud networking, and cloud security services.Deep expertise in Java/J2EE, RESTful APIs, microservices, and distributed systems.Experience with Kubernetes, Docker, CI/CD, and modern software delivery practices.Strong understanding of testing, debugging, troubleshooting, and production support.Experience designing, developing, and operating high-throughput, low-latency applications that process large transaction volumes while maintaining stringent SLA and SLO commitments.Proven success delivering measurable performance improvements, including application optimization, throughput scaling, latency reduction, JVM tuning, caching strategies, and database performance enhancements.Experience conducting performance testing, load testing, stress testing, benchmarking, and capacity planning for large-scale distributed systems.Experience implementing and operating Canary Deployments, Blue-Green Deployments, feature flags, progressive delivery, and automated rollback strategies.Experience building fault-tolerant systems with active-active architectures, resiliency patterns, graceful degradation, and automated recovery mechanisms.Strong understanding of Infrastructure as Code (Terraform), deployment automation, and DevOps practices.Experience with observability platforms, monitoring, logging, tracing, alerting, and operational analytics.Strong understanding of production operations, incident management, root cause analysis, and operational excellence.Experience designing API-first architectures, secure service communications, and enterprise integration patterns.Demonstrated ability to mentor engineers and influence technical direction across multiple teams.Experience leveraging AI-assisted development tools and automation to improve engineering efficiency and software quality.Information for US ApplicantsFor roles located in the US, the estimated salary range for this position is $192,300.00 to $ 307,600.00 USD per year, which may include potential sales incentive payments (if applicable). Salary may vary depending on job-related factors which may include knowledge, skills, experience, and location. In addition, this position may be eligible for bonus and equity.Visa has a comprehensive benefits package for which this position may be eligible that includes Medical, Dental, Vision, 401(k), FSA/HSA, Life Insurance, Paid Time Off, and Wellness Program.Work HoursVaries upon the needs of the department.Travel RequirementsThis position requires travel 5-10% of the time.Mental/Physical RequirementsThis position will be performed in an office setting. The position will require the incumbent to sit and stand at a desk, communicate in person and by telephone, frequently operate standard office equipment, such as telephones and computers.Visa is an EEO EmployerQualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protect veteran status. Visa will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with the EEOC guidelines and applicable local law.SummaryLocation: US - Foster City, CAType: Full time