Sr. Principal Engineer, Employee Experience (Hybrid - Seattle, WA)

About the role

At Nordstrom, we're committed to delivering outstanding customer experiences by harnessing the power of data. We are seeking a Sr. Principal Engineer - Employee Experience to join our Technology team. In this role you will define and drive the technical strategy, architecture, and engineering standards for the systems that power Nordstrom's financial operations, people process, and workplace collaboration. This work spans enterprise finance and ERP systems, HR and talent platforms, and the productivity and collaboration tools tens of thousands of Nordstrom employees rely on every day.

This is a strategic, influence-driven role that will shape how engineering teams design, secure, and scale the technology behind Finance, HR, and the Nordstrom workplace experience for years to come.

You will collaborate with executives and leaders across Finance, HR, Nordstrom Technology, and business functions to translate enterprise priorities into technical roadmaps, establishing the architectural foundations that enable operational excellence, employee experience, and AI-enabled productivity.

If you're passionate about enterprise engineering and ready to make a lasting impact on how Nordstrom works, we want to hear from you.

A day in the life

• Define Enterprise Technology Strategy: Develop and communicate a multi-year technical vision and roadmap for Finance, HR, Productivity and Collaboration systems, aligned with enterprise architecture, cloud strategy, and AI ambitions.
• Architect Core Business Systems: Own architecture and design patterns across financial systems (ERP, procure-to-pay, order-to-cash, financial planning), HR systems (Human Capital Management, commissions, recruiting, work force management), and productivity/collaboration platforms (M365, messaging, workflow, and service management tools). Establish SaaS integration patterns, API standards, event schema and data contracts connecting these systems to the rest of the enterprise.
• Lead Complex, Cross-Functional Initiatives: Lead design and delivery of large-scale initiatives, including platform modernizations, vendor migrations, technical debt deprecations and system consolidations, that span multiple engineering teams and business functions.
• Ensure Security, Compliance, and Resilience: Define architecture patterns for identity, access control, and data protection appropriate to sensitive financial and HR data. Partner with security, privacy, and compliance teams to meet PCI, SOC, data privacy, and audit requirements.
• Enable AI and Automation: Identify opportunities to apply AI, AI Native automation, SaaS AI features and self-service capabilities to finance, HR, and workplace processes. Guide teams evaluating AI-enabled tools, including conversational assistants, intelligent document processing, and workflow automation, for productivity and collaboration use cases.
• Build Engineering Culture and Talent: Set technical standards and best practices across the Finance, HR, and Productivity & Collaboration engineering portfolio. Mentor senior and principal engineers, participate in architecture reviews, and advise on technical career growth and promotions.

You own this if you have

• Extensive Experience: 15+ years in software engineering, systems architecture, or platform engineering, with demonstrated progression to strategic, enterprise-scope technical leadership.
• Domain Breadth: Hands-on experience architecting or engineering solutions across enterprise finance systems (ERP, GL, procure-to-pay), HR/HCM platforms (e.g., Workday or similar), and productivity/collaboration tools (e.g., Microsoft 365, ServiceNow, Slack).
• Integration and Data Expertise: Deep expertise in enterprise integration patterns, APIs, event-driven architecture, and the data flows connecting core business systems.
• Strategic Influence: Demonstrated ability to lead through influence rather than authority, building consensus with engineering, product, and business stakeholders.
• Security and Compliance Fluency: Working knowledge of the security, privacy, and regulatory considerations (Segregation of Duties, SOC, data privacy, access governance) relevant to financial and employee data systems.
• Platform Proficiency: Expertise with multiple cloud platforms (AWS & GCP preferred), modern application architectures, and enterprise SaaS ecosystems sufficient to evaluate build-vs-buy tradeoffs.
• Business Acumen: Ability to connect technical architecture to business outcomes and communicate value to executive stakeholders across Finance, HR, and Technology.
• Collaborative Leadership: Track record of developing engineering talent and building cross-functional partnerships across teams you don't directly manage.

Pay Range Details

The pay range(s) below has been provided in compliance with state specific laws. Pay ranges may be different for other locations.

Pay offers are dependent on the location, as well as job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.

$200,500.00 - $332,000.00 Annual

We've got you covered…

Our employees are our most important asset and that's reflected in our benefits. Nordstrom is proud to offer a variety of benefits to support employees and their families, including:

• Medical/Vision, Dental, Retirement and Paid Time Away
• Life Insurance and Disability
• Merchandise Discount and EAP Resources

This position may be eligible for performance-based incentives/bonuses. Benefits include 401k, medical/vision/dental/life/disability insurance options, PTO accruals, Holidays, and more. Eligibility requirements may apply based on location, job level, classification, and length of employment. Learn more in the Nordstrom Benefits Overview by copying and pasting the following URL into your browser:

A few more important points...

The job posting highlights the most critical responsibilities and requirements of the job. It's not all-inclusive. There may be additional duties, responsibilities and qualifications for this job.

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