Infrastructure Engineer (Mainframe Systems Programmer)

$86,500 - $146,100/Yr

Discover Financial Services - Riverwoods, IL

Full-time - Senior

Riverwoods, IL

Credit Intermediation and Related Activities

About the position

At Discover, we are committed to fostering a culture where diversity, teamwork, and collaboration are at the forefront. As an Infrastructure Engineer, you will play a crucial role in our mission to support our mainframe environment, ensuring that our systems operate smoothly and efficiently. This senior-level position involves working on holistic engineering deliverables across various stages of the product lifecycle, where you will determine technology patterns for overall solutions. You will lead and mentor junior engineers, guiding them in the adoption of new technologies and best practices. Your responsibilities will include managing risks and customer-impacting issues, ensuring that our mainframe systems are reliable and performant. In this role, you will monitor the mainframe system hardware and software for performance degradation, connectivity issues, and system events. You will be responsible for updating and managing tickets through resolution with vendors and internal support groups, testing and analyzing issues, and restoring services in a timely manner. You will also participate in a pager rotation to provide 24x7 support for Mainframe Systems, ensuring that we meet our commitments to our customers. Your expertise in CICS, MQ, DB2, and zOS will be essential as you plan and perform scheduled changes, provide consultative services to infrastructure and application teams, and contribute to technology communities. You will have the opportunity to initiate high-level solution designs and guide your team in achieving key software delivery capabilities. Additionally, you will support research activities to adopt new technology solutions and create opportunities for core product teams to learn engineering best practices. This position is not just about maintaining systems; it's about leading the way in mainframe engineering and contributing to the success of Discover.

Responsibilities

• Monitors the mainframe system hardware/software for performance degradation, connectivity issues, system events and alerts.
• Updates and manages tickets through resolution with vendors and internal support groups.
• Tests, analyzes, performs corrective actions, and restores availability and services in a timely and accurate manner to eliminate/reduce application impact.
• Provides timely notifications to management/outage team and escalates tickets to appropriate internal and external management as needed.
• Participates in pager rotation to provide 24x7 support for Mainframe Systems (Prod, Test, Development).
• Plans and performs scheduled changes (patching, maintenance, deployment, decommission, configuration, performance tuning) for all hardware and software used to support the mainframe infrastructure.
• Provides consultative services to infrastructure and application teams regarding project work, POCs and/or troubleshooting exercises.
• Achieves product commitments by using informal leadership & highly developed communication skills and contributes to or leads technology communities.
• Uses automation, system tools, open-source solutions, observability and 'security first' principles in daily work.
• Contributes to team agile ceremonies, leads demos and presentations, helps new engineers learn established norms.
• Initiates high level solution design approaches, and guides team to achieve desired key software delivery capabilities using automated, coded enterprise and observability.
• Participates in internal speaking and advocacy events.
• Supports research activities to adopt new technology solutions in ways of developing new capabilities.
• Continues professional education and creates opportunities for core product teams to learn engineering best practices.
• Coaches immediate chapter and actively fosters the adoption of new technologies.
• Provides leadership in mainframe on-line and batch design with an emphasis on high availability design.
• Provides expertise in performance tuning and enhancements.
• Supports several major applications (Development, testing, & production installation).
• Provides mainframe consulting services to infrastructure and application teams on project development.
• Provides support for managed service team.
• Researches and implements new mainframe technologies to enhance existing infrastructure.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field.
• 3+ years of experience in Software Engineering, DevOps, or related fields.
• Technical proficiency rating of competent on the Dreyfus engineering scale (for internal applicants).

Nice-to-haves

• Experience in Mainframe Engineering, Unix/Linux Administration, Database Systems or related CICS Systems with knowledge of CICS Plex environments.
• 4+ years of Mainframe knowledge.
• Knowledge of Mainframe MQ.
• Knowledge of Mainframe DB2.
• Knowledge of Mainframe Modernization.
• Knowledge of Parallel Sysplex.
• Knowledge of CTG and zOS Connect.
• Knowledge of VSAM.
• Knowledge of JCL, TSO REXX, ISPF, and other core mainframe skills.
• Knowledge of Mainframe Communication Server.
• Knowledge of zOS Connect (zCEE) and an understanding of DB2 Rest Services.

Benefits

• Paid Parental Leave
• Paid Time Off
• 401(k) Plan
• Medical, Dental, Vision, & Health Savings Account
• STD, Life, LTD and AD&D
• Recognition Program
• Education Assistance
• Commuter Benefits
• Family Support Programs
• Employee Stock Purchase Plan