Principal Software Engineer

Overview
The health and reliability of one of the world’s largest cloud networks starts with data. Our team builds the high-scale data platforms and engineering systems that transform network telemetry and operational signals into trusted, actionable intelligence for Microsoft Azure. We are building the foundation that enables engineers, automation, and intelligent systems to understand network health, detect emerging problems, and drive faster and more reliable operational decisions.

As a Principal Software Engineer, you will provide technical leadership for the architecture and evolution of large-scale distributed data platforms that ingest, process, enrich, store, and publish network telemetry and operational data. You will define engineering strategy and architectural direction for systems where scale, availability, data quality, performance, and operational reliability are critical. You will tackle ambiguous, cross-cutting technical challenges, establish engineering patterns and platform abstractions, and influence investments across organizational boundaries while partnering with teams throughout Azure Networking.

In this role, you will have the opportunity to shape the architecture of cloud-scale data platforms, drive technical strategy across complex distributed systems, and influence how network data enables the next generation of automated and intelligent operations in Azure. You will also mentor engineers and technical leaders, raise engineering standards, and help the organization make durable architectural decisions that enable sustained growth and innovation.

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees, we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.

Responsibilities
Provide technical leadership and define the architectural direction for highly scalable, reliable distributed data platforms that ingest, process, enrich, store, and publish network telemetry and operational data.
Lead the design and evolution of cloud-scale streaming and batch data systems, solving highly complex and ambiguous engineering problems across scalability, availability, performance, resiliency, data quality, and operational efficiency.
Drive long-term technical strategy across multiple teams, identifying opportunities for product-level impact and establishing reusable architectures, engineering patterns, and platform capabilities that enable consistent solutions at scale.
Partner across Microsoft Azure Networking and the broader Microsoft Azure organization to lead architectural and design reviews, align technical investments, manage cross-system dependencies, and deliver cohesive solutions across organizational boundaries.
Own critical capabilities end to end, from architecture and design through implementation, production readiness, operation, and continuous improvement, ensuring systems meet high standards for security, reliability, maintainability, and engineering quality.
Serve as a technical authority for engineering excellence, proactively identifying systemic technical risks and driving improvements in design, code quality, testing, observability, performance, reliability, and operational practices.
Mentor and influence engineers and technical leaders, developing engineering capability across teams while fostering sound technical decision-making, collaboration, accountability, and a culture of continuous learning.

Qualifications
Required Qualifications:

Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 6+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, Python, Go, or Rust
OR equivalent experience.
Other Requirements:

Ability to meet Microsoft, customer and/or government security screening requirements are required for this role.
These requirements include, but are not limited to the following specialized security screenings: 
Microsoft Cloud Background Check: This position will be required to pass the Microsoft Cloud Background Check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.
Preferred Qualifications:

Master's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 8+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python
OR Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 12+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python
OR equivalent experience.
1+ year(s) extensive experience architecting, building, and operating large-scale distributed systems and high-volume data platforms in production environments.
1+ year(s) deep technical expertise in distributed systems, data processing, streaming and batch architectures, with demonstrated ability to design for scalability, availability, resiliency, performance, and data quality.
1+ year(s) experience designing cloud-scale platforms that enable telemetry, monitoring, diagnostics, automation, or other data-driven operational capabilities.
1+ year(s) experience applying artificial intelligence, machine learning, or agentic software development approaches to production systems, developer productivity, automation, diagnostics, or operational scenarios.