Principal Architect
ACI Worldwide · Norcross
Powering the world’s payments ecosystem
ACI powers the payments ecosystem – globally, and you power ACI. You’ll innovate, collaborate, and grow – in an energetic technology culture with decades of proven success. ACIers – in all roles and levels – are truly your colleagues and many are your friends. Our size and reach allow you to see the global impact of your work. You are visible, your talents are valued, and you are empowered to shape the future of payments.
About the role
As a Principal Architect at ACI, you'll shape how multiple products and platforms are built — taking on the toughest technical assignments where there's no obvious solution and setting architectural direction that spans well beyond a single team. You'll mentor architects and senior engineers across the organization and help align the broader architecture community around ACI's unified enterprise direction as cloud-native and AI-enabled practices become the default.
What You'll Own
Provide architecture leadership across multiple products or platforms — not just a single domain — resolving the toughest technical assignments where there's no obvious solution
Perform significant mentoring and coaching of architects and senior engineers across the organization, communicating with broader architecture and engineering audiences to raise the collective bar
Provide architectural and big-picture oversight for new or enhanced products and services, and create or shape Architecture Roadmaps that span product lines
Drive compliance with and evolution of ACI's architectural standards across customer and product initiatives org-wide
Support development and product leadership with high-level analysis, design reviews, performance/scalability guidance, and deep subject-matter expertise
Plan and direct cross-product initiatives: review scope, plan resource use, and partner with project managers to ensure critical programs land
Research and evaluate emerging technologies, design patterns, and products at a strategic level, determining what's worth incorporating across ACI's portfolio
Maintain and actively leverage cross-product architectural knowledge, driving reuse of techniques and technologies across teams where it creates real value
Set the standard for how AI/ML and cloud-native architecture are used across multiple product lines, not just within a single team
- Define how ACI’s platforms authenticate and authorize non-human payment initiators, positioning ACI’s architecture relative to emerging agent-initiated payment standards and agent identity/consent frameworks
- Define how AI coding and development agents are used safely across the SDLC — what can be delegated, what requires human review, and how architectural governance (ADRs, fitness functions) adapts as agents generate and modify production code
Work directly with customers on innovative ideas and projects, translating customer needs into long-term technical strategy
May select staff and provide input to performance reviews; contribute to resource planning and capital budget decisions for the architecture function
Align the broader architecture community around critical directional issues, assisting Chief Architects in setting unified enterprise direction
Our Tech Stack
Deep expertise in this exact stack isn’t a hard requirement – strong architects from adjacent stacks are welcome to apply.
- Architecture modeling & governance — recognized expertise producing and reviewing ADRs, architecture models, and fitness-function frameworks across multiple teams
- Domain-driven design — deep, applied expertise using DDD to resolve real-time cross-system boundary problems at scale
- Cloud & data architecture — deep, cross-product expertise in multi-cloud design and data platform architecture (data lakes, warehouses, streaming)
- Gen AI / ML architecture — sets standards for AI/ML pipeline architecture across multiple product teams, including governance and observability practices
- Agentic commerce & agent payment protocols — working knowledge of the agent-initiated payment landscape (agent identity, consent/mandate verification, agent-scoped tokenization) and a point of view on how ACI’s platforms should interoperate with it
- Payments & financial systems — deep expertise in payment processing standards and flows (ISO 8583, ISO 20022, card networks, real-time payment rails)
- Security & compliance architecture — recognized expertise in IAM, zero-trust design, and regulatory architecture (PCI-DSS, SOC 2, GDPR, regional payment regulations) across products
- Fraud, risk & tokenization architecture — deep expertise in real-time fraud/risk engines, tokenization strategy, and network-level risk scoring across payment flows
What You Bring
You don't need to check every box below to apply — if most of this resonates, we want to hear from you.
15+ years of related experience, including deep technical product architecture and/or product development experience, architectural modeling (UML or equivalent), and extensive experience applying design patterns to real engineering problems
Advanced critical thinking — you take on the toughest technical assignments precisely because there's no obvious solution, and you're comfortable being the final word when trade-offs are genuinely hard
Systems thinking that spans multiple products — you see where complexity and risk will emerge across product boundaries, not just within one
Deep, cross-product expertise in SaaS and cloud-native architecture, with a track record of decisions that held up across multiple teams and products
A track record of turning curiosity into org-wide capability — the investigations you drive change how multiple teams work, not just your own
Exceptional architectural judgment and the credibility to make final calls on cross-product trade-offs, including cost, security, and regulatory constraints
Extensive experience architecting secure, multi-cloud solutions at an organizational level
Deep experience with data architecture, governance, and regulatory reporting design across products
Strong point of view on enterprise AI/ML architecture, grounded in real implementation experience
A point of view on how AI/agentic tooling fits safely into the software development lifecycle, and how architectural governance evolves as agents take on a growing share of implementation work
A demonstrated track record of mentoring and growing architects and senior engineers, and of aligning the broader technical community around shared direction
Outstanding communication — credible with engineering leadership, product leadership, and customers alike
Bonus Points
Extensive experience in payments, financial services, or another regulated industry
A track record of defining or evolving an enterprise-wide reference architecture
Experience contributing to industry standards bodies, whitepapers, or open-source projects
Experience selecting, developing, or evaluating technical staff
A history of running or scaling technical enablement programs (guilds, workshops, hackathons) across the organization
Experience with agent-initiated payment protocols or agent identity/consent frameworks, or with cost-aware (“FinOps”) architecture at scale
In return for your expertise, we offer opportunities for growth, career development, and a competitive compensation and benefits package—all within an innovative and collaborative work environment.
Are you ready to help us transform the payments ecosystem? To learn more about ACI Worldwide, visit our web site at www.aciworldwide.com Job ID (Requisition #20019)
ACI Worldwide is an AA/EEO employer in the United States, which includes providing equal opportunity for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities, and an EEO employer globally.
Important Notice About Recruitment Scams
Job seekers should be aware of ongoing recruitment scams where individuals or organizations impersonate legitimate companies to offer fake job opportunities. These scams often involve requests for personal information, payments, or interviews through unofficial channels. Please be cautious and verify any communications claiming to be from our company (www.aciworldwide.com / @aciworldwide.com). The ACI Worldwide recruitment team will always follow official channels and will never request payment.
#LI-LF1
#LI-Hybrid
ACI Worldwide is a global leader in mission-critical, real-time payments software. Our proven, secure and scalable software solutions enable leading corporations, fintechs and financial disruptors to process and manage digital payments, power omni-commerce payments, present and process bill payments, and manage fraud and risk. We combine our global footprint with a local presence to drive the real-time digital transformation of payments and commerce.