Pay is based on several factors which vary based on position. These include labor markets and in some instances may include education, work experience and certifications. In addition to your pay, Target cares about and invests in you as a team member, so that you can take care of yourself and your family. Target offers eligible team members and their dependents comprehensive health benefits and programs, which may include medical, vision, dental, life insurance and more, to help you and your family take care of your whole selves. Other benefits for eligible team members include 401(k), employee discount, short term disability, long term disability, paid sick leave, paid national holidays, and paid vacation. Find competitive benefits from financial and education to well-being and beyond at https://corporate.target.com/careers/benefits.

About us:

Working at Target means helping all families discover the joy of everyday life. We bring that vision to life through our values and culture. Learn more about Target here.

As a Senior Engineer on the Gift Card Platform team, you'll design and build highly scalable, reliable platform capabilities that power critical Gift Card experiences across Target. You'll combine strong backend and distributed systems engineering expertise with modern AI application development to build the next generation of intelligent, AI-ready platform capabilities. You'll serve as a technical leader, shaping architecture, influencing implementation decisions, and establishing engineering best practices. You'll work across APIs, data, events, integrations, large-scale file and data processing, distributed systems, and guest-facing backend capabilities, while also helping evolve the platform with domain AI agents, MCP tools and services, and agentic workflows. You are equally comfortable solving complex distributed systems problems and applying emerging AI technologies where they create meaningful value. You bring strong software engineering fundamentals and build production systems that are secure, scalable, resilient, observable, and maintainable.

Use your skills, experience and talents to be a part of groundbreaking thinking and visionary goals. As a Sr. Engineer, you’ll take the lead as you…

• Use your technology acumen to apply and maintain knowledge of current and emerging technologies within specialized area(s) of the technology domain. Evaluate new technologies and participate in decision-making, accounting for factors such as viability within Target’s technical environment, maintainability, and cost of ownership. Initiate and execute research and proof-of-concept activities for new technologies.

• Lead the design, lifecycle management, and total cost of ownership of services. Design and build highly scalable platform capabilities and backend services using Kotlin, Java, and Micronaut, including secure, high-performance REST and GraphQL APIs.

• Design distributed and event-driven systems using Kafka, asynchronous messaging, webhooks, distributed caching, and cloud-native architecture patterns. Build scalable data and file processing capabilities that support high-volume workloads with strong resiliency and fault tolerance.

• Design and optimize data persistence and caching solutions using technologies such as PostgreSQL and Redis, including data modeling, indexing, query optimization, transactional integrity, and high-performance data access patterns.

• Lead functional design and architecture discussions, code and design reviews, testing, debugging, automation, and implementation activities, ensuring architectural and operational requirements and engineering best practices are met.

• Build and operate highly available, secure, resilient, and observable P1 services and platforms. Improve performance and operational health through distributed tracing, metrics, logging, monitoring, and continuous improvement.

• Apply AI-assisted software development tools throughout the software development lifecycle, including design, implementation, testing, debugging, documentation, and code review, while maintaining high standards for quality, security, architecture, and maintainability.

• Design and build production-grade AI capabilities using Target-approved technologies, including domain AI agents, agentic workflows, MCP tools and services, and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG). Apply prompt and context engineering, tool integration, and AI evaluation practices to improve quality, reliability, and relevance.

• Optimize AI capabilities for quality, latency, throughput, reliability, and cost while applying responsible AI, security, privacy, governance, and observability practices. Build reusable AI components and identify opportunities to improve platform capabilities, developer productivity, operations, and engineering workflows.

• Provide technical oversight and coach others to resolve complex and severe technical issues. Partner across engineering and product teams to influence technical direction, establish engineering best practices, and deliver scalable solutions.

• Lead disaster recovery activities and contribute to disaster recovery planning. Embed data quality protocols throughout data acquisition, processing, storage, and operational use.

Core responsibilities of this job are described within this job description. Job duties may change at any time due to business needs.

About you:

• 4 year degree or equivalent experience

• 5+ years of software development experience

• Demonstrates strong domain-specific knowledge regarding Target’s technology capabilities, and key competitors’ products and differentiating features

• Working knowledge on package-specific configuration and deployment along with ability to build custom solutions

• Designs new testing methods and resolves routine and non-routine technical issues with minimal assistance

• Demonstrates strong proficiency in core development platforms within own domain

• Builds strong commitment within the team to support the appropriate team priorities

• Clearly communicates Agile concepts to partners within product team

• Demonstrates a solid understanding of the impact of own work on the team and/or guests

• Writes and organizes code using multiple computer languages, including distributed programming and understand different frameworks and paradigm

• Delivers high-performance, scalable, repeatable, and secure deliverables with broad impact (high throughput and low latency)

• Influences and applies data standards, policies, and procedures

• Maintains technical knowledge within areas of expertise

• Stays current with new and evolving technologies via formal training and self-directed education

• Strong proficiency in Kotlin and/or Java, with experience building backend services using Micronaut, Spring Boot, or similar frameworks

• Experience designing distributed systems and service-oriented architectures, including REST and/or GraphQL APIs, event-driven architectures, asynchronous messaging, and webhooks

• Experience building large-scale data and file processing capabilities, including high-volume data access, transformation, asynchronous processing, fault recovery, and performance optimization

• Experience with relational databases such as PostgreSQL and distributed caching technologies such as Redis, including data modeling, indexing, transactions, query optimization, and high-performance data access patterns

• Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, cloud-native architectures, and modern CI/CD pipelines

• Experience building and operating highly available and resilient production systems, with an understanding of data consistency, fault tolerance, observability, and production operations

• Experience designing or building AI-powered applications, tools, or agentic workflows using modern Large Language Models (LLMs) and related AI technologies

• Understanding of modern AI application architecture and practices, including prompt and context engineering, Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), tool calling, agent orchestration, MCP, and AI evaluation

• Experience applying security, privacy, governance, reliability, observability, and cost considerations to production AI applications

• Proficiency in Python for AI application development, automation, or AI tooling

• Experience effectively leveraging AI-assisted engineering tools and workflows while maintaining strong standards for code quality, security, architecture, testing, and maintainability

• Demonstrates strong technical leadership and collaboration skills, including mentoring engineers, leading technical design discussions, influencing architecture, and translating complex business and technical problems into scalable engineering solutions

This position will operate as a Hybrid/Flex for Your Day work arrangement based on Target’s needs. A Hybrid/Flex for Your Day work arrangement means the team member’s core role will need to be performed both onsite at the Target HQ MN location the role is assigned to and virtually, depending upon what your role, team and tasks require for that day. Work duties cannot be performed outside of the country of the primary work location, unless otherwise prescribed by Target. Click here if you are curious to learn more about Minnesota. 

Benefits Eligibility

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

In compliance with state and federal laws, Target will make reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities. If a reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, please reach out to [email protected]. Non-accommodation-related requests, such as application follow-ups or technical issues, will not be addressed through this channel.