Principal Software Engineer

Are you passionate about building large-scale, high-performance distributed systems that power the intelligent edge of the Internet? Do you thrive on solving complex technical challenges at global scale and enjoy working on systems that millions of customers depend on every single day?

The Azure Front Door (AFD) service is an Edge Distribution Platform that provides application delivery, acceleration, global load balancing, security, and intelligent routing for some of Microsoft's most critical services—Office 365, Xbox, LinkedIn, Azure Services—as well as thousands of enterprise customers worldwide. We operate at Internet scale, handling millions of requests per second across thousands of servers globally.

The AFD Management Services team owns how customers configure and operate Azure Front Door—this includes the Resource Provider (RP), management APIs and SDKs, CLI/PowerShell tooling, and the Azure Portal experience. Our mission is to deliver a seamless, reliable, and secure management experience that empowers developers and operators to confidently manage their global networking workloads. Every configuration change can impact billions of requests, so resilience, safety, and developer experience are our obsessions.

As a Principal Software Engineer, you will be the technical leader who sets the bar for architecture, code quality, and operability. You'll own critical management‑plane components and lead multi‑engineer efforts that ship new capabilities safely to a global fleet. Your work will directly shape how customers secure origins, roll out changes, validate configurations, and observe their edge traffic worldwide.

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.

• Architect and build globally distributed, highly available, low-latency management services that scale with Azure's growth.
• Lead technical design and engineering of core components for APIs, SDKs, and platform integration.
• Drive end-to-end reliability, availability, and security for critical configuration and onboarding flows.
• Champion developer experience, ensuring AFD is easy to use and integrates seamlessly with Azure tools and ecosystem.
• Collaborate closely with Azure portal UX, SDK, and platform teams to deliver consistent and best-in-class Azure experiences.
• Analyze system telemetry and metrics to ensure operational excellence at scale.
• Mentor and grow engineers through technical guidance and best practices.

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.
• 6+ years of software engineering experience with a track record in building distributed systems or cloud services.
• 1+ years expertise in designing and delivering scalable, reliable services in large, complex environments.
• 1+ years hands-on experience with C#/.NET, C++, or similar languages; proficiency in RESTful API design and SDK development is highly desirable.

Other Qualifications:

• 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:

• 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 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 equivalent experience.
• Understanding of cloud architecture, microservices, and asynchronous workflows.
• Passion for developer experience, API design, and customer empathy.
• Excellent problem-solving skills and ability to decompose complex problems into actionable solutions.
• A growth mindset with demonstrated ability to lead through influence, collaborate across org boundaries, and deliver results.

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.

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