Job Description

Career Area:

Engineering

Your Work Shapes the World at Caterpillar Inc.

When you join Caterpillar, you're joining a global team who cares not just about the work we do – but also about each other. We are the makers, problem solvers, and future world builders who are creating stronger, more sustainable communities. We don't just talk about progress and innovation here – we make it happen, with our customers, where we work and live. Together, we are building a better world, so we can all enjoy living in it.

Senior Principal Software Engineer – Platform Engineering

We are seeking a Senior Principal Software Engineer – Platform Engineering to lead the architecture, evolution, and technical direction of enterprise platform capabilities that support mission-critical applications at scale. This is a senior individual contributor role for an experienced engineer who brings deep platform expertise, strong architectural judgement, and the ability to influence technical strategy across multiple teams while remaining hands-on with complex engineering challenges.

You will play a critical role in shaping modern platform engineering practices across Kubernetes, distributed systems, platform reliability, security, and developer enablement. This role is ideal for someone who enjoys solving difficult systems problems, driving engineering standards, mentoring strong technical teams, and building platform foundations that accelerate product delivery and operational excellence.

What You’ll Do

Lead architecture and design decisions across platform domains including Kubernetes, compute, networking, storage, observability, security, and production operations.

Define and evolve platform standards, reference architectures, reusable patterns, and technical guardrails that enable scalable, reliable, and secure systems.

Drive complex technical decisions across availability, resiliency, scalability, fault isolation, disaster recovery, and lifecycle management.

Shape the direction of Kubernetes-based platform environments, including cluster architecture, upgrades, hardening, recovery, and operational readiness.

Partner closely with SRE, DevSecOps, Security, Infrastructure, and application engineering teams to ensure platform solutions are observable, supportable, secure, and production-ready.

Review major technical proposals, design decisions, and architecture changes, providing clear technical leadership and pragmatic engineering guidance.

Influence long-term platform strategy by identifying technical debt, architectural gaps, and modernisation opportunities across the platform ecosystem.

Lead troubleshooting and resolution of high-complexity platform issues across distributed systems, infrastructure, networking, storage, and runtime services.

Mentor engineers through design reviews, technical coaching, and architectural problem-solving, helping raise the organisation’s engineering quality bar.

Improve developer productivity and platform effectiveness through automation, simplification, and modern engineering practices, including AI-assisted engineering where appropriate.

What We’re Looking For

12+ years of experience in software engineering, platform engineering, infrastructure engineering, or distributed systems.

Proven experience designing, building, and operating large-scale, highly available production platforms.

Deep expertise in Kubernetes and container-based platform architecture in production environments.

Strong grounding in distributed systems, Linux, networking, storage, system design, and platform reliability engineering.

Ability to influence technical direction and drive alignment across teams without depending on formal organisational authority.

Strong architectural thinking, sound engineering judgement, and the ability to balance long-term platform strategy with practical delivery outcomes.

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.

Preferred Experience

Experience with on-premises, air-gapped, edge, or self-managed Kubernetes environments.

Experience with infrastructure automation and platform operations practices such as Terraform, Ansible, or GitOps.

Familiarity with platform security, observability, service mesh, and enterprise infrastructure patterns.

Experience working in a Platform Engineering + SRE shared-ownership model.

Experience in industrial, autonomy, or other mission-critical environments.

Exposure to Generative AI or agentic engineering tools applied to software delivery, platform operations, or developer productivity.

Posting Dates:

June 16, 2026 - June 22, 2026

Caterpillar is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Qualified applicants of any age are encouraged to apply

Not ready to apply? Join our Talent Community