Director, Authentication Engineering

Why USAA?

At USAA, our mission is to empower our members to achieve financial security through highly competitive products, exceptional service and trusted advice. We seek to be the #1 choice for the military community and their families.

Embrace a fulfilling career at USAA, where our core values – honesty, integrity, loyalty and service – define how we treat each other and our members. Be part of what truly makes us special and impactful.

We are proud to support active-duty military spouses. USAA roles may offer remote or hybrid flexibility for active-duty military spouses consistent with applicable policy and business needs.

The Opportunity

As a dedicated Director, Authentication Engineering, you will lead the engineering organization responsible for the critical authentication platforms, infrastructure, and services that enable USAA's Workforce Identity and Access Management capabilities. You will be accountable for the strategy, architecture, engineering, modernization, resiliency, and lifecycle of enterprise authentication services, including Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, ForgeRock, OIDC, and SAML-based capabilities, ensuring secure, highly available, scalable, and seamless access while advancing USAA's evolving identity strategy.

We offer a flexible work environment that requires an individual to be in the office 4 days per week. This position can be based in one of the following locations: San Antonio, TX, or Plano, TX. Relocation assistance is available for this position.

What you'll do:

• Lead the Authentication Engineering organization and establish the engineering strategy and multi-year technology roadmap for enterprise authentication platforms, infrastructure, protocols, integrations, and services that enable secure workforce access across USAA.
• Ensure the security, reliability, resiliency, availability, scalability, and recoverability of critical authentication services by establishing engineering standards, platform health metrics, lifecycle management, capacity planning, disaster recovery, and operational readiness expectations.
• Partner across Workforce IAM, Cybersecurity, Infrastructure, Cloud, and application engineering teams to translate authentication requirements into scalable engineering capabilities, enabling secure and consistent access to enterprise applications and infrastructure while advancing modern authentication patterns.
• Lead the modernization and evolution of enterprise authentication, including the transition from legacy authentication platforms and protocols toward modern identity services, phishing-resistant authentication, passwordless capabilities, stronger conditional access, automation, and cloud-integrated authentication architectures.
• Responsible for strategic ownership of critical security domains or capabilities, develops multi-year roadmaps and/or a leader of Manager Seniors.
• Establishes and ensures compliant execution of their information security domain's short- and long-term strategic vision, strategy, goals, and metrics and governs the overall policies, standards, and procedures for their assigned information security domain.
• Directs and ensures effective operation of an enterprise information security domain including capacity, resilience and dependability capabilities and how changes in conditions, operations, or the environment will affect the system's operation.
• Develops, reviews and communicates information security risk management policies and procedures in partnership with the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and other senior leaders to ensure appropriateness and adequacy versus industry best practices and regulatory requirements.
• Interfaces with external regulators to represent USAA in discussions regarding their specific information security domain.
• Oversees the continuous monitoring of cybersecurity activities and alerts senior management to potential risks, compliance issues, and operational inefficiencies.
• Develops, designs, and delivers a sustainable governance and assurance model across multiple domains and the Enterprise.
• Identifies, monitors and evaluates operational solutions to reduce information security risk, meet compliance requirements and increase enterprise workforce efficiency, business agility and workforce scalability.
• Promotes information security awareness across the enterprise and with the external security community.
• Serves as financial steward for the organization and manages manpower and budgets to ensure they cost-effectively meet the needs of the organization.
• Builds and oversees a team of employees for assigned functional area through ongoing execution of recruiting, development, retention, coaching and support, performance management, and managerial activities.
• Ensures risks associated with business activities are effectively identified, measured, monitored, and controlled in accordance with risk and compliance policies and procedures.

What you have:

• Bachelor's degree in Information Security, Information Technology, Computer Science, Business Administration, Information Systems/Management, or related field; OR 4 years of relevant education and/or experience.

• 8 years of related information security experience in one or more domains, e.g.: Cyber Security, Identity and Access Management, Information Assurance and Governance, Operational Risk Management and/or Information Technology to include significant accountability for projects, programs, processes, or policies.
• 3 years of direct team lead, supervisor, or management experience in an Information Security or Information Technology domain.
• 4 years of researching, designing or implementing technology, information security or cybersecurity solutions in a large financial institution or large enterprise information security program with a proven track record of delivering results in compliance with federal/state/regulatory information security and risk management policies, standards, and guidelines.
• Expert knowledge of relevant regulations and standards related to risk management and information security, e.g.: FFIEC, Gramm-Leach-Bliley, FFIEC Cybersecurity Assessment Tool, NIST Cybersecurity Framework and the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard.
• Strong knowledge of security technologies to include cryptography, authentication, authorization, and controls.
• Strong Knowledge of IT risks and experience implementing security solutions.
• Knowledge of threats, vulnerabilities, attack methods and countermeasures for web-based applications, networks, and cyber security solutions.
• Demonstrated financial acumen involving budgets, forecasting, and executing on the budgets for applicable information security, cybersecurity, or technology support function.
• Expert level of business acumen in the areas of business operations, risk management, industry practices and emerging trends.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to communicate technical analyses to a non-technical audience.

What sets you apart:

• 10+ years of leadership experience in cybersecurity, identity and access management, or authentication services.
• Extensive experience with Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, and ForgeRock platforms.
• Deep understanding of authentication and federation technologies including OIDC, OAuth 2.0, SAML, Kerberos, LDAP, and MFA.
• Proven experience leading large-scale enterprise authentication or identity modernization programs.
• Experience implementing Zero Trust security architectures.
• Strong knowledge of identity governance, access certification, privileged access management, and directory services.
• Demonstrated success managing highly available security platforms supporting enterprise-scale environments.
• Familiarity with regulatory and security frameworks such as NIST, FFIEC, SOX, and CIS Controls.
• Experience leading cross-functional engineering, operations, and security teams.
• Strong executive communication, strategic planning, and vendor management skills.
• Relevant certifications such as CISSP, CISM, SABSA, Microsoft Identity certifications, or equivalent.

Compensation range: The salary range for this position is: $164,780.00 - $314,960.00.

USAA does not provide visa sponsorship for this role. Please do not apply for this role if at any time (now or in the future) you will need immigration support (i.e., H-1B, TN, STEM OPT Training Plans, etc.).

Compensation: USAA has an effective process for assessing market data and establishing ranges to ensure we remain competitive. You are paid within the salary range based on your experience and market data of the position. The actual salary for this role may vary by location.

Employees may be eligible for pay incentives based on overall corporate and individual performance and at the discretion of the USAA Board of Directors.

The above description reflects the details considered necessary to describe the principal functions of the job and should not be construed as a detailed description of all the work requirements that may be performed in the job.

Benefits: At USAA our employees enjoy best-in-class benefits to support their physical, financial, and emotional wellness. These benefits include comprehensive medical, dental and vision plans, 401(k), pension, life insurance, parental benefits, adoption assistance, paid time off program with paid holidays plus 16 paid volunteer hours, and various wellness programs. Additionally, our career path planning and continuing education assists employees with their professional goals.

For more details on our outstanding benefits, visit our benefits page on USAAjobs.com.

Applications for this position are accepted on an ongoing basis, this posting will remain open until the position is filled. Thus, interested candidates are encouraged to apply the same day they view this posting.

USAA is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or status as a protected veteran.