Principal engineer Jobs in Berkeley, CA

Overview Microsoft is a company where passionate innovators come to collaborate, envision what can be and take their careers further. This is a world of more possibilities, more innovation, more openness, and the sky is the limit thinking in a cloud-enabled world. Microsoft’s Azure Data engineering team is leading the transformation of analytics in the world of data with products like databases, data integration, big data analytics, messaging & real-time analytics, and business intelligence. The products our portfolio include Microsoft Fabric, Azure SQL DB, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure PostgreSQL, Azure Data Factory, Azure Synapse Analytics, Azure Service Bus, Azure Event Grid, and Power BI. Our mission is to build the data platform for the age of AI, powering a new class of data-first applications and driving a data culture. Within Microsoft Fabric, the Real-Time Intelligence team enables organizations to act on data as it happens. By combining real-time ingestion, streaming, event processing, and observability signals, the team delivers capabilities that help customers detect patterns, respond to events, and drive immediate action. These experiences are tightly integrated into Fabric to support modern applications and operational decision-making in real time. The Azure Event Grid engineering team is seeking a talented and highly motivated Principal Software Engineer to lead the design and implementation of the next generation of PubSub solutions for customers worldwide. We are looking for an engineer with deep understanding in distributed systems, strong analytical skills, and a proven track record of delivering large-scale services end to end. As a Principal Software Engineer, you will own the technical design of system components, define design patterns that ensure scalability, reliability, and high availability, and help shape the long-term technical direction of the service. You will mentor engineers, lead design and code reviews, collaborate across teams, and partner with customers to unblock adoption scenarios. In addition, you will drive operational excellence to maintain the highest standards of service availability. In this role, you will work closely with PMs, EMs, and researchers to bring new innovations to life, develop early proof-of-concepts, and collaborate with technical leaders across Microsoft Fabric to transform ideas into meaningful product value. You will also drive improvements in artificial intelligence (AI) tools and practices across the software development lifecycle (SDLC). This includes taking responsibility for the quality and accuracy of AI-generated requirements, design documents, code, and other assets, while helping the broader team adopt and apply these practices effectively. We do not just value differences or different perspectives. We seek them out and invite them in so we can tap into the collective power of everyone in the company. As a result, our customers are better served.

Responsibilities

• Drives requirements and design by partnering with stakeholders, including program managers, technical leads, and architects, to define and refine messaging system requirements. Leverages telemetry, customer feedback, and usage patterns to inform architectural decisions and shape the product roadmap. Establishes continuous feedback loops to measure customer value, reliability, and operational health, ensuring future design iterations are data-driven.
• Champions coding best practices, design patterns, and reusable frameworks across the team. Ensures production-ready code with minimal defects and mentors engineers through hands-on guidance and comprehensive code reviews.
• Defines testing strategies for messaging system components, establishing quality gates and success criteria across unit, integration, and end-to-end testing. Drives improvements in test coverage, removes obsolete tests, and identifies gaps in the testing framework. Leads the integration of automation into CI/CD pipelines to continuously validate reliability and performance under realistic workloads.
• Improves engineering productivity by identifying tooling gaps across the cloud messaging development lifecycle. Designs and builds internal tools, frameworks, and libraries that streamline development, debugging, and operational workflows. Evaluates and advocates for open-source solutions where appropriate. Mentors engineers on modern tooling practices and fosters a culture of continuous improvement in developer experience.
• Drives incident response and operational excellence as a DRI. Monitors messaging systems for degradation, downtime, and service interruptions, driving rapid root-cause analysis and resolution of complex distributed systems issues. Coordinates cross-functional response efforts, communicates status to stakeholders, ensures SLA compliance, authors post-incident reviews, and drives systemic improvements to prevent recurrence.

Embody our [culture](https://careers.microsoft.com/v2/global/en/inclusion/) and [values](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/about/corporate-values)

Qualifications

Required/Minimum 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.

Job Requirements: Other & Additional 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/Additional Qualifications

• 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.
• Experience in building highly-scalable cloud services.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems.
• Experience in building Messaging brokers or Pub Sub systems is an added advantage.

Software 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. 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 This position will be open for a minimum of 5 days, with applications accepted on an ongoing basis until the position is filled. --- Microsoft 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. If you need assistance with religious accommodations and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, read more about [requesting accommodations.](https://cloudblogs.microsoft.com/microsoftfacilities/tag/accommodations/)