Principal Software Engineer

Overview

We are looking for a Principal Software Engineer to join the Special Projects and Resources Team (SPARTANs) in M365 Core - Substrate. SPARTANs tackle strategic projects and hard problems across M365 Core that remove agility and modernization barriers for engineers across Substrate.

About The Team

Substrate is the data and intelligence platform that underpins Microsoft 365, enabling partner teams to build, run, and modernize compliant, reliable services on a global scale. SPARTANs exist so the organization can move faster and make greater impact: we stand up outcome-oriented missions that unblock critical programs in modernization, resilience, cost optimization, compliance, and developer productivity. We are an organization dedicated to serving others, always striving to make a positive impact across teams and the broader community.

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

• Take on problems where the requirements, ownership, and sometimes the root cause are all unsettled.
• You build a working model of an unfamiliar codebase quickly, form a defensible hypothesis, and convert open-ended asks into scoped projects with clear success criteria.
• Own the technical outcome of high-visibility projects from problem framing through deployment and measured impact.
• Build the coalitions the work depends on.
• Exercise strong judgement in deciding what to build, what to defer, and what to stop.
• Diagnose and fix latency, scale, and cost problems in always-on distributed services.
• Grow the engineering community by mentoring senior and principal engineers.

What you will bring

• A track record of technical leadership on complex distributed systems.
• Depth in design and coding in C#, Java, C++, Rust, or a comparable language.
• Solid distributed systems fundamentals.
• Demonstrated performance engineering experience.
• Excellent cross-group influence and communication skills.

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, JavaScript, or Python OR equivalent experience.