Principal Software Engineer – IBM z/OS Connectivity

Role overview

A senior engineering role focused on extending a SaaS automation orchestration platform natively onto IBM z/OS mainframes. The selected engineer will help build a new connectivity agent delivered as a Java process that bridges modern enterprise automation with core mainframe subsystems, spanning custom wire protocols, cryptography, and native platform integration. This is a principal-track position contributing to architectural design, systems-level validation on live LPARs, and ongoing reliability, performance, and security improvements.

Responsibilities

- Design, develop, test, and maintain native software supporting connectivity and integration with IBM z/OS mainframe environments. - Build integrations with core mainframe technologies, including JES2/JES3 job submission and monitoring, TSO command execution via background TMP, and SMF-based event monitoring. - Implement per-user authorization and security flows that extend the platform's existing identity and credential management capabilities. - Develop systems-level capabilities involving custom wire protocols, cryptography, and native z/OS platform integration through C/JNI and a Java agent. - Troubleshoot complex issues that span mainframe, Unix, and Java environments, and improve reliability, performance, security, and scalability. - Validate technical assumptions on live LPARs, document protocols, security models, and platform prerequisites, and contribute to architecture reviews and code reviews.

Requirements

- 10+ years of professional software engineering experience with strong Java 8+ skills. - Hands-on z/OS systems integration experience covering JES2/JES3, TSO, RACF/ACF2/Top Secret, SMF, and USS. - Strong working proficiency in C and comfort with low-level integration via JNI. - Low-level network protocol experience, including socket programming, custom binary framing, character-encoding conversion, and TLS/keyring security. - Experience implementing cryptographic primitives to specification using standard libraries such as Java JCE, rather than designing cryptographic protocols from scratch. - Strong concurrency and multithreading skills, with experience building resilient, long-running daemon processes. - Familiarity with modern DevOps tooling, including Git, CI/CD, Docker, and Kubernetes, and the ability to work from primary IBM manuals rather than relying on tutorials or unverified AI output.

Nice to have

- Experience with IBM Semeru or other z/OS Java implementations. - Background with enterprise workload automation products and adjacent mainframe tooling. - Familiarity with Sysplex, Parallel Sysplex clustering, or z/OSMF REST APIs. - Experience with JCL library tooling such as CA-Panvalet or CA-Librarian. - z/OS Assembler experience, particularly relevant to future authorized-code or SMF-exit work. - Prior involvement in mainframe migration or modernization projects. - Fluency with AI-assisted engineering tools, combined with the judgment to identify plausible but incorrect AI recommendations involving specialized mainframe APIs.