Principal Software Engineer

Position Summary...

What you'll do...

About Team

The Walmart Payroll Modernization Team is transforming how payroll technology is built, operated, and scaled for one of the world's largest workforces. The team owns the strategy, design, implementation, and continuous evolution of next-generation payroll platforms, ensuring that millions of associates are paid accurately and on time while meeting complex regulatory and business requirements.

Working at the intersection of product, engineering, and payroll operations, the team drives modernization initiatives, builds new capabilities, simplifies legacy processes, enables large-scale business transformations, and establishes best-in-class engineering and operational practices. The team is passionate about solving complex challenges at enterprise scale and creating payroll experiences that are reliable, compliant, and future-ready.

Walmart’s Corporate Tech and Services is a powerhouse of several exceptional teams delivering world-class technology solutions and services making a profound impact at every level of Walmart.  

As a key part of Walmart Global Tech, our teams set the bar for operational excellence and leverage emerging technology to support millions of customers, associates, and stakeholders worldwide. Each time an associate turns on their laptop, a customer makes a purchase, a new supplier is onboarded, the company closes the books, physical and legal risk is avoided, and when we pay our associates consistently and accurately, that is CTS. Joining CTS means embarking on a journey of limitless growth, relentless innovation, and the chance to set new industry standards that shape the future of Walmart. 

What you will do

• Be part of one of the world's largest Payroll Modernization programs, delivering payroll solutions that support more than 1.6 million associates every month across a highly complex enterprise ecosystem.
• Define and drive the strategic architecture of enterprise payroll solutions, ensuring scalability, compliance, security, and operational resilience across large-scale US payroll operations.
• Lead the design and implementation of core payroll capabilities including payroll processing, retroactive accounting, taxation, garnishments, benefits deductions, time integration, off-cycle payments, and year-end processing.
• Architect solutions that support complex US payroll requirements including multi-state taxation, reciprocity agreements, resident and non-resident tax scenarios, supplemental wage processing, wage attachments, and evolving federal, state, and local compliance mandates.
• Drive a platform-first mindset, building scalable, reusable, and future-ready payroll capabilities rather than point solutions.
• Design and deliver new payroll features, enhancements, and capabilities that enable future business growth, regulatory compliance, workforce flexibility, and changing legislative requirements.
• Own payroll solution design across SAP HCM Payroll, Payroll Control Center (PCC), and related HR, Finance, Tax, and Time Management ecosystems.
• Partner with Tax, HR, Finance, Legal, Product, and Engineering teams to ensure payroll solutions meet regulatory requirements, audit standards, data governance policies, and enterprise control objectives.
• Champion payroll operational excellence by improving payroll accuracy, reducing defects, automating controls, strengthening auditability, and improving payroll processing efficiency at scale.
• Establish architecture standards and governance for payroll schemas, wage type frameworks, payroll calculations, integration patterns, and extension strategies while minimizing technical debt and customization complexity.
• Solve complex business and technical challenges at massive scale, balancing payroll accuracy, compliance requirements, system performance, user experience, and operational efficiency.
• Provide technical leadership during payroll incidents, legislative updates, tax changes, year-end activities, mergers and acquisitions, payroll migrations, and large-scale transformation initiatives.
• Drive continuous modernization of payroll technology through automation, observability, AI-assisted operations, self-service capabilities, and adoption of industry best practices.
• Mentor other engineers, architects, and payroll specialists while influencing the future direction of payroll technology through strategic solution design and executive-level stakeholder engagement.

What you will bring

• 15+ years of experience leading enterprise-scale SAP Payroll transformations, with deep expertise in payroll architecture, compliance, modernization, and operational excellence.
• Expertise in U.S. Payroll, including BSI TaxFactory, Federal, State and Local Taxation, Retroactive Accounting, Garnishments, Benefits, Payroll Accounting, Year-End Processing, and regulatory compliance.
• Extensive experience defining payroll strategy and architecture for large, complex organizations supporting multiple business units, legal entities, payroll frequencies, and workforce types.
• Proven success leading large-scale SAP HCM Payroll / Employee Central Payroll (ECP) modernization programs, payroll consolidations, cloud transformations, and merger/acquisition payroll integrations.
• Strong expertise in designing enterprise payroll ecosystems integrating SAP Payroll with SuccessFactors, Workday, ServiceNow, SAP Finance, tax engines, banking partners, benefits providers, treasury systems, and custom enterprise platforms.
• Experience leveraging AI, automation, and advanced analytics to improve payroll accuracy, reduce operational risk, accelerate testing cycles, enhance compliance monitoring, and modernize payroll operations.
• Demonstrated experience implementing payroll controls, audit frameworks, reconciliation strategies, and compliance governance processes to ensure accuracy and regulatory adherence at scale.
• Expertise in payroll architecture decisions involving schemas, PCR frameworks, integrations, extensibility models, payroll operations, observability, performance optimization, and resiliency.
• Proven ability to influence senior leadership, drive cross-functional alignment, and balance business priorities, compliance requirements, operational efficiency, and technology strategy.
• Strong leadership track record mentoring architects, engineers, payroll specialists, and functional consultants while establishing engineering standards and solution governance.
• Exceptional communication, presentation, and stakeholder management skills with experience partnering with executive leaders across HR, Finance, Tax, Compliance, Product, Engineering, and Operations.
• Expertise in global payroll governance, supporting harmonized payroll processes across multiple countries while ensuring local statutory compliance.
• Experience leading payroll modernization, migration, and payroll comparison activities using EPI-USE Variance Monitor to validate payroll results across parallel runs, country rollouts, acquisitions, and SAP Employee Central Payroll (ECP) implementations.
•   Strong understanding of global payroll controls, audit frameworks, and reconciliation processes, ensuring payroll accuracy, compliance, and operational excellence across large-scale payroll environments.

About Walmart Global Tech
Imagine working in an environment where one line of code can make life easier for hundreds of millions of people.  That’s what we do at Walmart Global Tech. We’re a team of software engineers, data scientists, cybersecurity expert's and service professionals within the world’s leading retailer who make an epic impact and are at the forefront of the next retail disruption. People are why we innovate, and people power our innovations. We are people-led and tech-empowered.

We train our team in the skillsets of the future and bring in experts like you to help us grow. We have roles for those chasing their first opportunity as well as those looking for the opportunity that will define their career. Here, you can kickstart a great career in tech, gain new skills and experience for virtually every industry, or leverage your expertise to innovate at scale, impact millions and reimagine the future of retail.

Walmart’s culture sets us apart, and we know being together helps us innovate, learn and grow great careers. This role is based in our [Bangalore/Chennai] office for daily work, with the flexibility for associates to manage their personal lives.

Benefits

Beyond our great compensation package, you can receive incentive awards for your performance. Other great perks include a host of best-in-class benefits maternity and parental leave, PTO, health benefits, and much more.

Belonging

We aim to create a culture where every associate feels valued for who they are, rooted in respect for the individual. Our goal is to foster a sense of belonging, to create opportunities for all our associates, customers and suppliers, and to be a Walmart for everyone.

At Walmart, our vision is "everyone included." By fostering a workplace culture where everyone is—and feels—included, everyone wins. Our associates and customers reflect the makeup of all 19 countries where we operate. By making Walmart a welcoming place where all people feel like they belong, we’re able to engage associates, strengthen our business, improve our ability to serve customers, and support the communities where we operate.

Equal Opportunity Employer

Walmart, Inc., is an Equal Opportunities Employer – By Choice. We believe we are best equipped to help our associates, customers and the communities we serve live better when we really know them. That means understanding, respecting and valuing unique styles, experiences, identities, ideas and opinions – while being inclusive of all people.

Minimum Qualifications...

Outlined below are the required minimum qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no minimum qualifications.

Option 1: Bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineering, computer information systems, software engineering, or related area and 5 years’ experience in software engineering or related area.
Option 2: 7 years’ experience in software engineering or related area.

Preferred Qualifications...

Outlined below are the optional preferred qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no preferred qualifications.

Master’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, computer information systems, software engineering, or related area and 3 years' experience in software engineering or related area., We value candidates with a background in creating inclusive digital experiences, demonstrating knowledge in implementing Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standards, assistive technologies, and integrating digital accessibility seamlessly. The ideal candidate would have knowledge of accessibility best practices and join us as we continue to create accessible products and services following Walmart’s accessibility standards and guidelines for supporting an inclusive culture.

Primary Location...

Block- 1, Prestige Tech Pacific Park, Kadubeesanahalli Village, Varthur Hobli , India