Principal Architect

Title: Principal Architect

Locations: 401 Las Colinas Blvd W Bldg A Irving, TX

Duration: 24 months

Work Engagement: W2

Work Schedule: 3 days in office/2 days remote

Benefits on offer for this contract position: Health Insurance, Life insurance, 401K and Voluntary Benefits

Summary:

The Chief Data Office (CDO) is building the future of data and engineering at Wells Fargo. As a Principal Architect, you will serve as the senior technical leader driving DevSecOps, CI/CD modernization, and release governance across the enterprise. You will define reference architectures, set engineering standards, embed security and compliance into delivery pipelines, and shape the technical strategy enabling predictable, secure, scalable software delivery.

This role partners closely with the Chief Development Experience Office (CDXO) to advance the Path to Production – Release Cargo Management (P2P RCM) framework and to streamline enterprise-wide release processes across GitHub Actions, Harness, and OpenShift.

Responsibilities:

Enterprise Architecture & Strategy

• Define technical vision and architecture roadmap for Cross Platform Engineering & Reference Architecture.

• Lead reference architecture development for web services, APIs, data pipelines, and integration patterns.

• Chair Architecture Review Boards and ensure alignment with enterprise governance.

• Produce architectural decision records (ADRs), technology roadmaps, and standards.
  

DevSecOps & CI/CD Architecture

• Architect enterprise-grade CI/CD patterns using GitHub Actions and reusable workflows.

• Integrate and govern security controls including Sonar, Checkmarx, Black Duck, GitHub Secret Scanning, and DAST.

• Design infrastructure-as-code, container security models, and automated compliance controls.

• Lead architecture for Harness CD deployments to OpenShift (OCP), including promotion, rollback, and audit-ready configurations.
  

Governance, Standards & Process

• Define development standards, deployment patterns, branching strategies, and release governance.

• Establish reusable workflows, automation frameworks, and observability patterns.

• Promote shift-left security, zero-trust principles, and defense‑in‑depth architectures.
  

Leadership & Influence

• Mentor engineering leaders and guide architectural decision-making across multiple domains.

• Evaluate emerging technologies in Python ecosystems, DevOps tooling, and AI-assisted development.

• Lead proofs-of-concept and drive adoption of platform engineering, DevSecOps, and SRE practices.

• Represent CDO in enterprise architecture forums and influence firm-wide technology direction.

Qualifications:

• Applicants must be authorized to work for ANY employer in the U.S. This position is not eligible for visa sponsorship.

• Strong software engineering and enterprise architecture background with expertise in Python.

• Deep experience architecting web applications, distributed systems, and APIs (Django, FastAPI, Flask).

• Extensive experience designing CI/CD pipelines, including GitHub Actions and reusable workflows.

• Hands-on experience integrating automated security scanning tools into CI/CD:
  Sonar, Checkmarx, Black Duck, GitHub Secret Scanning.

• Experience designing deployment automation to OpenShift using Harness CD (or equivalent).

• Strong background in DevSecOps, application security, threat modeling, and compliance automation.

• Proven enterprise architecture leadership developing standards and governance frameworks.

• Experience using AI-assisted development tools (e.g., GitHub Copilot).

• Expert-level Python engineering skills and familiarity with modern Python ecosystems. (preferred)

• Extensive experience with Django and Wagtail CMS / Wagtail CRX. (preferred)

• Strong background in testing architecture (Pytest). (preferred)

• Deep experience with Kubernetes/OpenShift platform architecture. (preferred)

• Significant experience building CI/CD automation at scale with GitHub Actions. (preferred)

• Experience with Kedro, MLFlow, Airflow, and distributed data pipelines. (preferred)

• Strong IaC/GitOps experience (Terraform, Ansible). (preferred)

• Broad experience with security tools, threat modeling, and compliance frameworks. (preferred)

• Experience partnering with Enterprise Architecture on standards and governance. (preferred)

• Familiarity with AI-enabled IDE strategies (Cursor, AWS Kiro). (preferred)

• Knowledge of Spec-Driven Development (GitHub Spec‑Kit), API-first design, and DDD. (preferred)

• Experience with observability architecture and SRE practices. (preferred)

• Proven success leading enterprise-wide modernization initiatives and influencing senior leadership. (preferred)

• Demonstrated open-source contributions (Conda‑Forge, Pixi, GitHub Actions). (preferred)