Principal Software Engineer

Microsoft Teams is the hub for modern collaboration—bringing together everything teams need to succeed, all within the Office 365 ecosystem. It serves as the canvas that unifies your content, tools, people, and conversations in one seamless experience. As one of Microsoft’s most dynamic and impactful products, Teams is redefining the future of teamwork—and we’re just getting started. Join us on this journey as we push the boundaries of what’s possible with Generative AI, Large Language Models (LLMs), and a world-class AI stack powering Teams Copilot and other cutting-edge AI experiences. You’ll be part of a team at the forefront of AI innovation, leveraging the latest in deep learning, natural language processing, and conversational AI to shape the future of work. Within the Messaging Services team, we’re evolving our microservices architecture to deliver new messaging capabilities while ensuring high performance, scalability, and cost efficiency. We’re looking for an experienced Principal Software Engineer to help us build robust, scalable backend services that power critical messaging experiences. This is a unique opportunity to sharpen your system design skills and work with a modern tech stack including .NET Core, TypeScript, Redis, and Azure Cosmos DB—all while collaborating across teams and organizations. 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

• Design, develop, and operate high-scale services that power the core messaging infrastructure of Microsoft Teams
• Apply cutting-edge techniques in deep learning, natural language processing, and conversational AI to enhance the intelligence and user experience of Microsoft Teams.
• Prototype, experiment, and evaluate new ideas to deliver next-generation AI-powered messaging features that redefine how teams communicate.
• Work closely with AI teams across Microsoft to share best practices, align on strategy, and leverage shared infrastructure and research.
•  Dive deep into Azure technologies and distributed database systems. Collaborate with internal and external partners to design features that drive user growth and engagement.
• Develop features that delight customers while upholding the highest standards of availability, reliability, performance, and scalability—never compromising on engineering fundamentals.
• Influence and define new designs, architectures, standards, and reusable service libraries that empower teams across Microsoft to build at scale.

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
• 3 years experience in distributed systems, client-server architecture, and distributed database technologies such as .NET Core, Redis, or Azure Cosmos DB or similiar
• 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
• Experience working with Service Fabric or Kubernetes.
• Experience working with M365 components like AAD, Exchange, Substrate, SharePoint.
• Drive to improve performance, availability and supportability of services.
• Drive to increase efficiencies through automation.
• OR Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 10+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python
• OR equivalent experience.

Software Engineering IC5 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $139,900 - $274,800 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $188,000 - $304,200 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here: https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay

Microsoft will accept applications for the role until October 7, 2025.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances.  We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

Benefits/perks listed below may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Microsoft and the country where you work.