Principal Software Engineer

Microsoft•Redmond, WA

About The Position

Security represents the most critical priorities for our customers in a world awash in digital threats, regulatory scrutiny, and estate complexity. Microsoft Security aspires to make the world a safer place for all. We want to reshape security and empower every user, customer, and developer with a security cloud that protects them with end to end, simplified solutions. The Microsoft Security organization accelerates Microsoft’s mission and bold ambitions to ensure that our company and industry is securing digital technology platforms, devices, and clouds in our customers’ heterogeneous environments, as well as ensuring the security of our own internal estate. Our culture is centered on embracing a growth mindset, a theme of inspiring excellence, and encouraging teams and leaders to bring their best each day. In doing so, we create life-changing innovations that impact billions of lives around the world. Microsoft Graph is the gateway to the data and intelligence that powers Microsoft 365, relied upon by millions of developers and enterprises to build connected, intelligent experiences. As organizations modernize productivity, collaboration, and identity across clouds and devices, Microsoft Graph provides a unified API surface that brings together people, relationships, files, insights, and organizational context. Our ambition is to enable every developer and customer to harness this rich, real‑time fabric of data securely and responsibly, unlocking new scenarios and accelerating digital transformation. The Microsoft Graph organization drives this mission by scaling a reliable, privacy‑first platform, advancing the underlying data models and APIs, and innovating so that our customers and partners can build solutions that reach billions of users. Our culture emphasizes growth mindset, technical excellence, and clarity of purpose - empowering teams to deliver high‑impact capabilities for the global ecosystem that depends on Microsoft Graph every day. 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.

Requirements

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.
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 background and Microsoft Cloud background check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.

Nice To Haves

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 Bachelor'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.
Expertise in API architecture: HTTP, OData, versioning strategies, error models, consistency patterns, and lifecycle management for large platforms.
Ability to drive architecture governance, set quality bars, and influence engineering decisions across partner teams.
Practical proficiency with AI‑assisted engineering workflows

Responsibilities

Architect Microsoft Graph API patterns grounded in OData, defining contracts for versioning, errors, throttling, and long‑term platform evolution.
Govern the end‑to‑end API review process, ensuring consistent quality bars, efficient approvals, and alignment with Graph reliability, privacy-first principles, and ecosystem needs.
Represent Microsoft in the OData Technical Committee, driving protocol improvements, shaping standards, and bringing external perspectives back into Graph platform design.
Champion AI‑assisted API design, introducing techniques, tooling, and automation that raise quality, reduce review friction, and scale API onboarding.
Drive developer experience excellence across permissions, compliance, telemetry, and consistency, ensuring APIs are predictable, intuitive, and maintainable at global scale.
Influence company‑wide architecture decisions, setting direction for Graph’s platform strategy and guiding workloads to adopt shared models and patterns.

Stand Out From the Crowd

Upload your resume and get instant feedback on how well it matches this job.

Upload and Match Resume