Pfizer · 17 hours ago
Principal Software Engineer – Forward Deployed
La Jolla, CA
Full-time
Hybrid
Lead/Staff
$163K/yr - $261K/yr
8+ years expPfizer is seeking a skilled Software Engineer who will design, build, and maintain software systems that deliver business value. In this forward-deployed role, you will focus on code quality and architecture decisions while bridging the gap between building products and solving real business problems through rapid solution delivery.
BiotechnologyHealth CareMedicalPharmaceuticalPrecision Medicine
No H1B
Responsibilities
Drive delivery of the most critical technical initiatives, establish engineering delivery practices across the business unit, and be the technical authority on high-stakes project
Develop technical leaders, shape engineering talent strategy across the business unit, and build high-performing engineering teams
Shape technology-driven business 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
Qualification
Required
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field with 8+ years of relevant experience OR 7+ years with MBA/MS degree
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
Expert-level Skills: Business Immersion: You are a recognized thought leader in your domain. You influence domain strategy across the business unit, exemplify the business immersion mindset that defines forward-deployed engineering, and shape how engineering engages with the business
Expert-level Skills: Data Integration: You define data integration patterns and best practices across the business unit. You architect large-scale data flows, solve the most complex integration challenges, and are the authority on enterprise data integration
Expert-level Skills: Full-Stack Development: 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 across the business unit, and exemplify polymathic engineering
Expert-level Skills: Multi-Audience Communication: You shape communication practices across the business unit. You represent engineering externally, communicate at board and executive level, and are recognized as an exceptional communicator who bridges any audience gap
Expert-level Skills: Problem Discovery: You shape approaches to problem discovery across the business unit. 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
Expert-level Skills: Rapid Prototyping & Validation: You shape culture around rapid validation and iterative delivery across the business unit. You are recognized for transformative fast delivery, define standards for prototype-to-production, and exemplify the 'deliver in days' mindset
Expert-level Skills: Stakeholder Management: You shape stakeholder practices across the business unit. You manage executive relationships, represent engineering at the highest levels, and are recognized for exceptional stakeholder partnerships
Expert-level Skills: Team Collaboration: You create collaborative culture across the business unit. You transform dysfunctional team dynamics, are recognized for building exceptional teams, and mentor others on collaboration excellence
Practitioner-level Skills: AI Evaluation & Verification: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: AI Literacy: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: AI-Augmented Development: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Architecture & Design: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Code Quality & Review: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Developer Experience: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Knowledge Management: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Pattern Generalization: You lead pattern generalization initiatives across teams, define criteria for when to generalize vs keep custom, and establish intake processes for receiving validated solutions from Forward Deployed Engineers. You mentor engineers on abstraction design
Practitioner-level Skills: Service Management: 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
Practitioner-level Skills: Site Reliability Engineering: You define reliability standards across teams in your area, drive post-incident improvements systematically, design capacity planning processes, and mentor engineers on SRE practices
Practitioner-level Skills: Technical Writing: 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
Working-level Skills: Cloud Platforms: You design cloud-native solutions, manage infrastructure as code, implement security best practices, and make informed service selections. You troubleshoot cloud-specific issues
Working-level Skills: Data Modeling: You create efficient data models that balance normalization with query performance. You optimize queries, handle schema migrations safely, and choose appropriate storage technologies
Working-level Skills: DevOps & CI/CD: You build complete CI/CD pipelines end-to-end, manage infrastructure as code (Terraform, CloudFormation), implement monitoring, and design deployment strategies for your services
Working-level Skills: Lean Thinking & Flow: You optimize team processes systematically, measure and improve cycle time, remove bottlenecks proactively, and deliver rapidly while maintaining quality
Working-level Skills: Technical Debt Management: 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
Working-level Skills: Time Management & Deep Work: You protect focused time for complex work, balance multiple priorities without dropping balls, minimize context switching, and help others understand your capacity
Benefits
Participation in Pfizer’s Global Performance Plan with a bonus target of 20.0% of the base salary
Eligibility to participate in our share based long term incentive program
401(k) plan with Pfizer Matching Contributions
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
Company
Pfizer
Pfizer is a biopharmaceutical company that discovers, develops, and delivers medicines and vaccines.
10001+ employees
Funding
Current Stage
Public CompanyTotal Funding
$38BKey Investors
Starboard Value
2025-11-21Post Ipo Debt· $6B
2024-10-07Post Ipo Equity· $1B
2023-05-16Post Ipo Debt· $31B
Leadership Team
Albert Bourla
Chief Executive Officer
Ian Read
Chief Executive Officer
Recent News
2026-01-25
Pharma Letter
2026-01-25
Company data provided by crunchbase