Principal Engineer, Alternative Investments Technology

Purpose. Performance. People.

Joining CPP Investments means joining one of the world’s most admired and respected institutional investors to drive a single mandate: to deliver strong, sustainable returns for generations of Canadians.  

 

With a long-term horizon and global reach, we deploy capital at scale across public and private markets. Our size, stability, and disciplined investment philosophy allow us to pursue complex opportunities and build enduring partnerships worldwide. 

 

For our people, this means meaningful work with tangible impact, real opportunity, and collaboration with exceptional colleagues who value partnership and performance. Here, you’ll contribute to outcomes that matter alongside team members committed to excellence and shared success. 

Role Summary:

Technology at CPP Investments is not a support function. It underpins how capital is allocated, how risk is measured, and how performance is evaluated across a global portfolio. The systems we design and operate directly influence high-consequence decisions that shape long-term outcomes at scale.

We are seeking a Principal Engineer to define architectural direction and elevate engineering standards across critical systems and data capabilities. This is a senior, hands-on individual contributor role operating at Director level. You will not only shape what we build, but how we build it.

Your influence will extend beyond a single team. You will guide high-impact technical decisions, strengthen DevOps and security practices, improve data product maturity, and enable responsible adoption of emerging technologies such as Generative AI.

If you are motivated by complex systems, consequential trade-offs, and raising the technical bar across an organization, this role offers uncommon scope and impact.

About This Opportunity
This Principal Engineer will operate within Alternative Asset Technology domain, which delivers the platforms and data capabilities that support a diverse set of private market strategies across private equity, real estate, infrastructure, credit, and other illiquid assets. These investments are central to the Fund’s long-term performance and require specialized technology solutions to support complex deal structures, portfolio analytics, and operational workflows.

The Principal Engineer will focus on strengthening architectural coherence across interconnected platforms, improving data integration and product maturity, and ensuring engineering practices scale alongside evolving investment and regulatory complexity.

Accountabilities & Qualifications:

Accountabilities

Architectural Direction and Technical Authority

• Define and evolve architectural direction across systems and data capabilities.
• Align domain-level architectural direction and engineering practices with enterprise design principles, lifecycle standards, and decision frameworks defined by the Technology Architecture & Practices function.
• Make and validate consequential trade-offs across scalability, resilience, performance, cost, and security.
• Ensure solutions are designed for operability, observability, and long-term sustainability.
• Exercise senior architectural judgement on complex cross-team initiatives and high-impact technical decisions in collaboration with peer Principal Engineers
• Collaborate with the Technology Architecture & Practices function to ensure domain architectures align with enterprise design principles, lifecycle standards, and long-term platform sustainability goals.

Cross-Team Influence and Enterprise Alignment

• Raise engineering standards across the department, not just within a single team.
• Influence senior engineers and business leaders through clear, well-reasoned technical judgement.
• Develop deep understanding of business domains to ensure architecture supports real-world workflows and outcomes.
• Work across teams to prevent siloed solutions and ensure architectural coherence.
• Mentor senior engineers and elevate technical standards across the organization.

Engineering Maturity and Organizational Uplift

• Strengthen DevOps discipline, deployment reliability, and secure-by-design engineering practices.
• Improve data product maturity through clarity of ownership, interoperability, and trusted consumption patterns.
• Guide responsible adoption of Generative AI and advanced automation.
• Actively prevent unnecessary technology proliferation and architectural fragmentation across teams

Leadership Competencies

• Enterprise Focus
  Demonstrates strong enterprise perspective in architectural decisions. Prioritizes long-term system integrity, interoperability, and risk posture over local optimization. Anticipates second- and third-order impacts across systems and data flows.
• Strategic Thinking
  Applies structured, evidence-based reasoning to complex technical challenges. Frames problems clearly, evaluates trade-offs rigorously, and shapes long-term technical direction aligned to organizational priorities.
• Constructive Engagement
  Influences senior engineers and business leaders through clarity of thought and technical credibility. Engages proactively across teams to resolve architectural inconsistencies and surface systemic risks early.
• Deliberate Execution
  Drives architectural decisions through to implementation. Ensures standards are applied in practice, not just defined. Balances delivery pressures with long-term sustainability and operational resilience.
• People Leadership

Demonstrates technical mentorship and coaching that measurably elevates engineering capability and standards across teams.

Functional Competencies

• Technical Leadership and Organizational Uplift

Shapes and elevates engineering practices beyond immediate team boundaries. Drives measurable improvements in standards, reliability, and architectural coherence across the organization.

• Enterprise Architecture and System Design
  Designs and governs scalable, resilient, and secure architectures across distributed systems. Ensures solutions are interoperable, observable, and sustainable.
• DevOps and Operational Excellence
  Strengthens automation, deployment reliability, and operational resilience. Embeds engineering discipline into build and run practices.
• Security and Risk-Aware Engineering
  Applies secure-by-design principles and disciplined vulnerability management. Balances innovation with risk mitigation.
• Data Architecture and Data Product Maturity
  Improves data quality, interoperability, and trusted consumption patterns across platforms.

Technical Judgement Under Ambiguity
Makes high-impact architectural decisions in complex, ambiguous environments, balancing competing priorities and long-term consequences.

Qualifications

• Degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience.
• 10+ years designing, building, and operating complex production systems at scale.
• Demonstrated ownership of architectural decisions with enterprise impact and influence across multiple teams or domains.
• Deep understanding of modern software architecture, cloud-native development, DevOps practices, and operational reliability.

You are motivated to contribute to something larger than yourself, approach complex challenges with rigor, and hold yourself to high standards in a collaborative, performance-driven environment. 

We provide colleagues with cutting-edge AI tools, dedicated learning time, and practical support to help them deliver with greater impact.

 

Inclusion & Accessibility

CPP Investments is committed to equitable access to employment and building a workforce that reflects diverse talent and perspectives. If you require accommodation at any stage of the recruitment process, please let us know and we will work with you to meet your needs. 

 

Attention: Protect Yourself from Fraud

CPP Investments is committed to a secure and transparent recruitment process. We will never ask candidates for payment or financial information at any stage of hiring. All legitimate opportunities are posted on our careers page, and communications will come from our applicant tracking system, Workday. 

CPP Investments may use AI tools to help screen and assess applicants by analyzing resumes and applications for relevant skills and experience. These tools support, but do not replace, human decision-making.

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