Principal Software Engineer

Cisco•Denver, CO

1d•$223,100 - $301,100

About The Position

The Collaboration organization at Cisco builds platforms and experiences that help engineering teams deliver software safely, consistently, and at enterprise scale. Our developer experience and GitOps platform work sits at the intersection of application engineering, cloud-native delivery, security, and operational excellence. This team develops the internal tools, services, workflows, and governance patterns that enable engineering groups to release and operate software through a unified, Git-driven model. We work across Java backend services, modern web experiences, Kubernetes and VM-based delivery, GitHub Actions, Argo CD, Vault, and related platform capabilities. In this role, you will be expected to operate as a strategic technical leader: shaping multi-year platform direction, advising senior leaders, influencing teams across functions, and solving complex problems that affect the direction and performance of the business.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree with 15+ years of relevant experience, Master’s degree with 12+ years, or PhD with 8+ years of experience in software engineering.
10+ years in full-stack development, including backend systems using Java or Spring Boot and frontend interfaces using React, Angular, or Vue.js.
Production experience crafting and delivering APIs, services, and platform workflows for large-scale enterprise environments.
Previous enterprise implementation of CI/CD pipelines and Git-based release automation using tools such as GitHub Actions.
Ownership of architecting and handling containerized, cloud-native applications within Kubernetes and distributed system environments.

Nice To Haves

Production experience with GitOps-based delivery using Argo CD or equivalent platforms.
Experience with HashiCorp Vault or comparable secrets-management technologies.
Experience with Helm, Kustomize, Terraform, Ansible, or other infrastructure and deployment automation tools.
Experience supporting both Kubernetes-based and VM-based deployment models at enterprise scale.
Breadth across platform engineering, developer experience, release engineering, security, observability, and operational readiness.
Experience defining technical standards, reference architectures, adoption plans, and success metrics for internal developer platforms.
Ability to anticipate business and industry changes, connect technical strategy to product outcomes, and develop innovative approaches beyond existing solutions.
Practical experience with AI-assisted development, agentic workflows, or automation patterns that improve engineering productivity while maintaining governance and security standards.
Strong mentoring presence and demonstrated ability to raise engineering quality across teams through influence, review, and technical guidance.

Responsibilities

Operate as a strategic technical leader, shaping multi-year platform direction.
Advise senior leaders.
Influence teams across functions.
Solve complex problems that affect the direction and performance of the business.
Spearhead enterprise-scale initiatives to modernize the engineering lifecycle, optimizing how teams build, deploy, and secure services across Kubernetes and VM-based environments.
Define robust reference architectures and governance models to standardize CI/CD automation, secrets management, and deployment visibility.
Act as a key advisor to senior leadership.
Resolve complex organizational blockers.
Influence teams through mentorship and cross-functional decision-making.
Drive the adoption of AI-assisted workflows and modern delivery models.
Represent the platform strategy to stakeholders, ensuring that these investments deliver measurable business outcomes and improved release velocity.