{"id":2673432,"url":"https://alion.io/job/microsoft-principal-software-engineer-fde","title":"Principal Software Engineer - FDE","company":{"id":18,"name":"Microsoft","domain":"microsoft.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/microsoft","size_band":"5000+","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Eightfold","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":75,"open_postings":93,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":1,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":28,"computed_at":"2026-10-16T05:45:00Z"}},"role":"Solutions","role_family":"Solutions","seniority":"lead","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Redmond, United States","Washington, United States","Mountain View, United States","Austin, United States","Houston, United States","Chicago, United States","Cambridge, United States","New York, United States","Atlanta, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":142800,"max":274800,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":274800},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":12,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"C#","optional":false},{"name":"C++","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":false},{"name":"JavaScript","optional":false},{"name":"Progressive Delivery","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"Threat Modeling","optional":false},{"name":"Azure","optional":true},{"name":"LLM","optional":true},{"name":"OpenAI","optional":true},{"name":"Prompt Engineering","optional":true},{"name":"RAG","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-07-16T22:02:32Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-14","last_verified_at":"2026-10-16T22:23:12Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":92,"trust":{"level":"stale","repost_count":0,"flags":["stale"],"days_open":91},"description":"OverviewIn the Microsoft Frontier Company Engineering team, you won’t just build software; you’ll deliver real outcomes for some of the world’s most complex organizations.\nWe are a global team of world-class engineers who have been working in a Forward Deployed Engineering (FDE) model for more than a decade, embedding directly within customer teams to solve their toughest challenges, side-by-side, and shipping production-ready solutions in days, not months.\nAs a Principal Software Engineer, you will bring strong software design and engineering expertise, building reliable systems and production-ready services that turn ideas and data-driven insights into scalable solutions. You’ll work in small, multidisciplinary crews alongside data scientists, product managers, and domain experts, owning the full lifecycle from design through to deployed solutions.\nOur work is powered by AI, applying the mindset and tooling across the entire development lifecycle to move from idea to production in days while maintaining the highest standards of security, quality, and trust.\nThis role offers the opportunity to:\nBuild reliable, production-ready systems and services that turn ideas into scalable solutions\n\nShip engineering work that directly influences business strategy and customer outcomes\n\nCollaborate with leading global organizations across industries\n\nApply the latest advancements in AI and software engineering to solve problems at scale\n\nMicrosoft’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.\nResponsibilities\nPut security first:Build and ship solutions that meet enterprise security standards (threat modeling, secure coding, privacy, and compliance) from design through production.\n\nTranslate business needs into technical solutions:Partner with stakeholders to define problem statements, success metrics, and architectural approaches that deliver measurable outcomes.\n\nDesign and lead architecture:Own end-to-end system design for cloud and AI workloads, making sound tradeoffs across reliability, performance, cost, and maintainability.\n\nDeliver quickly without sacrificing quality:Use modern engineering practices (CI/CD, automated testing, observability, and progressive delivery) to iterate fast and reduce operational risk.\n\nDrive customer success and adoption:Work directly with customer engineering teams to deliver production-ready solutions, unblock delivery, and ensure outcomes are adopted at scale.\n\nBuild reusable, scalable assets:Create solution accelerators, reference architectures, and code that can be reused across customers and scenarios to maximize impact.\n\nOperate effectively in ambiguity:Continuously learn and adapt as technologies and customer priorities evolve; bring clarity, structure, and momentum to complex engagements.\n\nLead and mentor across disciplines:Provide technical direction, coach engineers, and collaborate with product, data, and security partners to deliver as one team.\n\nLead complex delivery end-to-end:Coordinate multiple workstreams, manage dependencies, and raise the bar on reliability and operational excellence for services running in production.\n\nModel inclusive, customer-obsessed leadership:Create an environment of trust, accountability, and continuous improvement while representing the company professionally with external stakeholders.\n\nQualifications\nRequired/minimum qualifications\nBachelor'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.\nOther Requirements\nMicrosoft is unable to sponsor a work visa for this role due to the nature of the role’s job duties.\n\nAdditional or Preferred Qualifications (PQs)\nMaster'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.\n\nExperience designing, deploying, and operating AI or LLM-based solutions, including prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented approaches, model tuning, evaluation, data quality, performance monitoring, and use of cloud AI platforms\n\nFamiliarity with deploying and operating AI systems in production environments\n\nUnderstanding of model evaluation, data quality, and performance monitoring\n\nExperience using cloud AI platforms (Azure ML, OpenAI, or similar)\n\nEnjoy travel and are comfortable with travel up to 25%\n\nSoftware Engineering IC5 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $142,800 - $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.\nCertain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here:\nhttps://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay\nThis position will be open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled.\nMicrosoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. 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