Staff Software Engineer

Navient Solutions LLC

Navient (Nasdaq: NAVI) helps students and families confidently manage the cost of higher education. We create long-term value for customers and investors through responsible lending, flexible refinancing, trusted servicing oversight, and decades of portfolio management expertise. Our employees thrive in a culture of belonging, where they are supported and proud to deliver meaningful outcomes. Learn more at navient.com.

As a Staff Software Engineer at Navient you’ll develop and execute on the technical strategy of an engineering team to revolutionize in-school consumer lending, automating the loan approval process and orchestrating the transfer of billions of dollars. In addition to the $10+ billion in loans originated, we build tools to maximize Navient’s growth while providing the best possible client experience. Our focus is on building an extensible, modern platform that allows us to move faster over time. This means a willingness to rethink domains from first principles and an ability to collaborate well across technical and non-technical teams.

Why You’ll Like It Here

Navient offers a values‑driven culture where belonging and recognition matter, professional growth is supported, and wellbeing is taken seriously. You’ll find a workplace that invests in learning and development, provides a comprehensive benefits and total rewards program, and encourages employees to give back through company‑supported community initiatives.

How You'll Contribute:

Software Development

• Build customer-facing software products and solutions using Node.js, TypeScript, React/Redux, Python, PostgreSQL, and Docker
• Write unit and integration tests using Javascript, Node.js, Mocha, Chai, Sinon, Sequelize
• Document technical designs using proven software design principles and diagrams (e.g. sequence diagram)
• Troubleshoot, identify, and fix defects through standard techniques such as debugging, profiling, logging, log analysis via Splunk, tracing reproduction steps, and using tools such as FullStory to replay user sessions
• Monitor deployment of code to Staging and, eventually, Production environments using GitHub Actions
• Integrate software products with tools for marketing, analytics, content management, tracking, etc
• Build & support API integrations with partners for tracking and updates
• Provide support for tagging and conversion tracking, SEO and pricing updates
• Support the creation and modification of landing pages via content management integration. Support testing of various personalization and optimization features within the product flow

Software Architecture and Leadership

• Drive the technical direction and strategy of the team
• Responsible for creating or facilitating the creation of Engineering Requirements Documents (ERDs)
• Optimize and standardize engineering processes and best practices
• Document, decompose, and size project stories into development tasks that yourself or other developers can take ownership of and code per the stated acceptance criteria

Requirements Analysis

• Review and provide critical feedback on Product Requirements Documents (PRDs), Epics, and Stories
• Provide recommendations to Product Manager or Sr Engineering Manager/Director on alternative product or technical solutions that would optimize the proposed product feature in terms of speed of delivery, superior customer experience, and/or cost savings
• Participate and provide input to early product discovery, user research, and requirements definition

Mentoring, Coaching and Onboarding Engineers

• Serve as a mentor to one or more Software Engineers
• Provide coding and architecture feedback to other engineers using Github or through pair programming
• Onboard new engineers to the team by sharing best practices and keeping team documentation (in Confluence or Github) up-to-date

Operational Support

• Participate in our devops culture and provide rotating on-call support for production application software system(s) that comprise Navient’s customer-facing and internal lending systems
• During on-call support the Senior Staff Software Engineer is responsible for responding to system alerts, triaging the problem performing log and dashboard analysis, utilizing system and application monitors and AWS Cloudwatch monitors to determine the severity and priority of the problem
• Ultimately the Software Engineer is responsible for either fixing the problem or escalating to other application support teams as appropriate

Minimum Requirements:

• Bachelor’s Degree- Computer Science or related fields of study. Additional equivalent experience above the required minimum may substitute
• 6+ years of professional software development experience, including leading the architecture, design, development, and deployment of large-scale systems
• Strong experience with relational databases (e.g., PostgreSQL)
• Hands-on experience with cloud-based infrastructure (AWS or comparable platforms)
• Experience working with containerized environments (e.g., Docker)
• Additional equivalent education above the required minimum may substitute for level of experience

Preferred Qualifications:

• Masters Degree in Computer Science or related fields of study
• Experience working in the Financial Tech industry
• Software design principles
• Secure coding principles
• Database queries / SQL
• Microservices
• Web Content Management
• Native application development using frameworks such as React
• Github & GitHub Actions
• Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery services
• AWS Architecture & Services (ex: API Gateway)
• Marketing & Analytics Tools (Optimizely, Amplitude, Storyblok, GTM, Segment, Fullstory, etc.)

In addition to meaningful work, Navient offers a benefits package designed to support balance, flexibility, and long‑term wellbeing.

Benefits designed with balance in mind.

Navient’s benefits are thoughtfully designed to support employees from day one, with an emphasis on stability, flexibility, and long‑term support. From health coverage to financial security and time away, our approach is simple: provide meaningful support that helps work feel sustainable.

What’s included:

• Paid time off that begins accruing on Day 1, plus My Day and paid company holidays.

• Medical, dental, and vision coverage for eligible employees and dependents, with access to health advocacy support.

• A 401(k) plan with employer match to support long‑term financial security.

• Company‑paid basic life insurance and short‑ and long‑term disability coverage.

• Employee Assistance Program (EAP) and wellbeing resources, including digital health and chronic‑condition support.

• Family planning resources.

• Pet insurance.

• Learning, development, and career growth opportunities through tuition reimbursement and our e-learning platform.

IMPORTANT NOTICES:

All offers of employment are contingent on standard background checks. Depending on the needs of our business, the successful candidate may be subject to further background checks to determine eligibility and suitability.

EOE Race/Ethnicity/Sex/Disability/Protected Vet/Sexual Orientation/Gender Identity. Navient Corporation and its subsidiaries are not sponsored by or agencies of the United States of America.

Navient is a drug free workplace.