Principal Software Architect

Microsoft • Redmond, WA

12d • $165,600 - $331,200

About The Position

Microsoft Security: Purview Team is building the data security platform for the era of AI. Our team develops globally distributed services that discover and classify sensitive data at scale and enforce protection across Microsoft 365, endpoints, AI experiences, and multicloud data estates. As autonomous agents increasingly read documents, call tools, create derived content, and act on a user’s behalf, the industry needs new ways to understand where sensitive data originated, how it was transformed, and which protections follow it through every interaction.
We are looking for a Principal Software Architect to define and build that next generation of data protection. You will shape how data sensitivity is represented and propagated through agent runtimes, and design protection decisions that can reach enforcement points within synchronous, performance-critical call paths. You will set architectural direction across multiple organizations, build production systems in both owned and partner codebases, and translate incomplete requirements into durable technical foundations that other teams can confidently build upon. This is a hands-on leadership role for an engineer who can move between writing critical code, resolving complex distributed-systems challenges, and establishing technical alignment across Microsoft.
The scope is broad because the space is still being defined. Success requires engineering judgment, comfort making consequential decisions with incomplete information, and the influence to turn competing perspectives into a shared direction. If you want to help establish how enterprise data is protected as AI agents become a fundamental part of computing, this is an opportunity to define both the architecture and the standards that will shape that future. Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. We bring that mission to life through a culture of growth mindset, innovation, inclusion, respect, integrity, and accountability.

Requirements

• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, or related technical discipline 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.
• 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.

Nice To Haves

• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 15+ 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 12+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python OR equivalent experience.
• 10+ years of experience designing, building, and operating scalable, highly available cloud services or distributed systems, including production ownership, automated testing, and CI/CD practices.
• 7+ years of experience leading technical architecture across multiple engineering teams or organizations, including defining technical contracts, standards, or shared patterns adopted outside the immediate team.
• Experience designing secure, latency-sensitive policy evaluation, authorization, or access-control systems, with applied knowledge of authentication, data protection, access control, and secure coding practices.
• Experience building applications with LLMs and generative AI technologies, including agent orchestration, prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation, fine-tuning, or model evaluation using frameworks such as LangChain, LlamaIndex, AutoGen, DSPy, Transformers, Haystack, or equivalent.

Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end architecture for a critical area of the data security platform, from design and implementation through deployment and live-site operations, while defining a durable roadmap that evolves with adjacent systems.
• Author and drive high-quality technical designs, ensuring architectural decisions, interfaces, tradeoffs, and operational requirements are thoroughly reviewed, documented, and understood by engineering partners.
• Write production code and prototype the hardest technical challenges, using working implementations to validate designs and remaining close enough to the codebase to provide credible direction through design and code reviews.
• Lead technical alignment across engineering organizations, influencing teams outside your direct reporting structure and establishing shared architecture, dependency contracts, cross-team roadmaps, and clear ownership boundaries.
• Own the reliability and supportability of services operating at cloud scale, including meaningful telemetry, safe deployment and rollback practices, effective on-call operations, and measurable reductions in incident frequency and severity.
• Raise the security, privacy, and compliance bar through threat modeling, enforceable security invariants, automated deployment gates, continuous scanning, security monitoring, and audit-ready evidence.
• Ensure cross-service solutions are production-ready, including end-to-end testing, live-site coverage, dependency validation, and established escalation paths before capabilities are released.
• Establish responsible, AI-native engineering practices across requirements, design, development, testing, and operations, with clear human accountability for AI-assisted and AI-generated assets.
• Mentor and grow engineers through direct technical leadership, including design reviews, code reviews, coaching, and the development of individual contributors who can independently lead complex areas.
• Model clarity and sound engineering judgment in ambiguous spaces, turning incomplete information into actionable technical direction and enabling multiple teams to execute against a shared vision.

Benefits

• 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

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal