Lead Software Engineer (Full Stack)

About Northern Trust:

Northern Trust, a Fortune 500 company, is a globally recognized, award-winning financial institution that has been in continuous operation since 1889.  

Northern Trust is proud to provide innovative financial services and guidance to the world’s most successful individuals, families, and institutions by remaining true to our enduring principles of service, expertise, and integrity. With more than 130 years of financial experience and over 22,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

About Us

The Private Passport Platform is a core, client‑facing digital platform that supports wealth management clients and partners across account access, money movement, document exchange, investments, and secure collaboration. It is a cornerstone of our broader digital strategy and is actively evolving toward a modern, cloud‑based architecture with improved resiliency, scalability, and user experience. 

Our team works closely with Product, Design, Architecture, Security, and Data partners to deliver features that are secure, reliable, and intuitive—while supporting both web and mobile experiences at scale. 

Role Summary

We are looking for a Lead Software Engineer (Full‑Stack) to provide hands‑on technical leadership for the Private Passport Platform.

In this role, you will:

• Lead the design and delivery of complex full‑stack features
• Set engineering standards and guide technical decisions
• Act as a go‑to technical leader for engineers, product partners, and architects
• Balance hands‑on development with technical oversight and mentorship

This is a builder‑leader role - you will write code, review code, influence architecture, and help the team deliver reliably at scale.

Key Responsibilities

Technical Leadership

• Lead the end‑to‑end design and implementation of full‑stack solutions across web, API, and backend services
• Partner with architecture and platform teams to align solutions with cloud and security standards for Private Passport 
• Make sound technical decisions that balance speed, quality, security, and long‑term maintainability
• Identify and address technical debt, performance risks, and reliability gaps

Hands‑On Engineering

• Build and maintain high‑quality, production‑ready code across frontend and backend layers
• Lead and participate in code reviews, setting a high bar for quality and clarity
• Support mobile and web experiences, ensuring consistency and reliability across channels 

Team Enablement & Mentorship

• Mentor engineers through pairing, design reviews, and constructive feedback
• Help engineers grow their technical depth and system‑level thinking
• Promote best practices in testing, observability, and operational readiness

Cross‑Functional Collaboration

• Work closely with Product and Design to translate requirements into scalable technical solutions
• Partner with Security, Data, and Platform teams to ensure compliance, resilience, and performance
• Contribute to PI planning, technical forums, and leadership discussions for the Private Passport Platform 

What you will do

• Design, develop, and maintain server-side logic using Java/Spring Boot
• Build and optimize RESTful APIs and microservices for seamless integration with front-end applications.
• Work with relational databases and NoSQL databases, ensuring data integrity and performance.
• Implement secure authentication and authorization mechanisms (e.g., OAuth).
• Develop responsive and interactive user interfaces using React.js and related libraries (e.g., Redux, React Router).
• Ensure cross-browser compatibility and optimize front-end performance for a seamless user experience.
• Collaborate with UX/UI designers to translate wireframes and designs into functional components.
• Integrate front-end and back-end components to create cohesive, end-to-end solutions.
• Troubleshoot and debug issues across the stack to ensure application reliability and performance.
• Write clean, maintainable, and well-documented code following best practices and coding standards.
• Participate in Agile ceremonies (e.g., sprint planning, daily stand-ups, retrospectives).
• Work closely with product managers, designers, and other developers to deliver features on time and within scope.
• Contribute to code reviews, ensuring high-quality code and knowledge sharing within the team.
• Optimize applications for scalability, performance, and security.
• Participate in the evaluation and adoption of new tools, frameworks, and methodologies. 

Required Qualifications

• A bachelor's degree in computer science, software engineering, or a related discipline. Experience is the most relevant factor.
• Experience building secure, client‑facing applications
• Solid understanding of distributed systems, APIs, and cloud‑based architectures
• 5+ years of experience with multiple programming languages such as Java/Spring Boot, JavaScript, React Ecosystem, Python, SQL/NoSQL, as well as unit testing frameworks.
• 5+ years of experience with cloud-native engineering, using PaaS, and microservices on cloud platforms such as AKS on Azure.
• Prior experience using methodologies & tools such as Scrum, SAFe, DevSecOps, SRE, ADO, GitHub, GitHub Actions, SonarQube, Checkmarks etc. to deliver high-quality products rapidly. 

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with cloud‑native architectures and modernization efforts
• Background in financial services or regulated environments
• Experience supporting mobile + web platforms used by external clients
• Familiarity with modern engineering practices such as CI/CD, automated testing, and observability

Why Join This Team

• Work on a high‑impact platform that directly supports clients and advisors
• Influence the technical direction of a strategic, evolving digital platform
• Collaborate with experienced product, design, and architecture leaders

Opportunity to shape how modern engineering practices are applied at scale

Salary Range:

Salary range is a good faith estimate of base pay. Northern Trust provides a comprehensive benefits package including retirement benefits (401k and pension), health and welfare benefits (medical, dental, vision, spending accounts and disability), paid time off, parental and caregiver leave, life & accident insurance, and other voluntary and well-being benefits. Northern Trust also provides a discretionary bonus program that may include an equity component.

Working with Us: 

As a Northern Trust partner, greater achievements await. You will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture in an organization where financial strength and stability is an asset that emboldens us to explore new ideas.

Movement within the organization is encouraged, senior leaders are accessible, and you can take pride in working for a company committed to assisting the communities we serve! Join a workplace with a greater purpose.

We’d love to learn more about how your interests and experience could be a fit with one of the world’s most admired and sustainable companies! Build your career with us and apply today. #MadeForGreater 

Reasonable accommodation

Northern Trust is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please email our HR Service Center at [email protected].

 
We hope you’re excited about the role and the opportunity to work with us. We value an inclusive workplace and understand flexibility means different things to different people.

Apply today and talk to us about your flexible working requirements and together we can achieve greater.