Principal Software Engineer - M365 - Copilot

Microsoft Office helps people and organizations around the world create, communicate, analyze, and get work done. Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote serve a vast and diverse customer base, creating a unique opportunity to bring AI capabilities into the tools people already rely on every day.

As a Principal Software Engineer on the Office AI team in the Office Product Group, you will define and build the AI foundation that empowers all Office apps.

You will set technical direction for shared systems that connect AI models with app capabilities and customer context—turning advances in AI into useful, trustworthy, and high-quality capabilities at Office scale. With the Office app teams, you will co-define user experiences that feel natural in each app while meeting Microsoft's expectations for reliability, performance, privacy, security, and accessibility.

This role calls for both technical vision and hands-on delivery. You will turn ambiguous opportunities into clear architectures and plans, then help teams deliver the designs, documentation, and production software needed to realize them. You will measure outcomes in shipped capabilities and customer impact, not just proposals.

Lead through technical judgment and example: mentor engineers, grow engineering practices, and align teams around clear architectures and measurable outcomes.

• Define and drive the technical strategy and shared foundation that empower AI-powered experiences across Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, and other Office apps.
• Design architectures for scalable services and client capabilities that Office app teams can build on to bring AI into their workflows, from individual features to cross-app experiences.
• Lead implementation of grounded, context-aware AI systems, including orchestration, retrieval, tool use, evaluation, and feedback loops as appropriate to the product.
• Deliver concrete engineering outcomes: architecture designs, clear technical specifications and decision documents, production-quality code, and reliable features operating in production.
• Own technical execution from problem framing through launch and operation; identify risks early, make tradeoffs explicit, and use telemetry and customer feedback to guide improvements.
• Balance quality, latency, cost, reliability, privacy, security, accessibility, and user control in product and platform decisions.
• Set a high bar for engineering quality across design, implementation, testing, deployment, observability, and incident response.
• Partner with product managers, designers, researchers, and Office app teams to co-define cohesive, app-specific user experiences and influence shared technical investments.

Required Qualifications (RQs)

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or a related technical field and 6+ years of technical engineering experience with coding in languages such as C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python, or equivalent experience.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals and experience designing, building, testing, deploying, and operating production software for cloud services, client platforms, or both.
• Experience delivering commercial-grade customer-facing products with high standards for availability, performance, reliability, security, privacy, and accessibility.
• A track record of leading complex, multi-team technical efforts from architecture through implementation, launch, and sustained operation.
• Demonstrated ability to turn technical direction into tangible results, including architecture designs, clear technical specifications and decision documents, and production software.
• Experience delivering office productivity capabilities that integrate with app workflows and customer context.
• Strong communication and cross-discipline collaboration skills, including the ability to influence technical direction across Office app teams and organizational boundaries.

Preferred Qualifications (PQs)

• Master's degree in Computer Science or a related technical field and 8+ years of technical engineering experience with coding, or a bachelor's degree in a related field and 12+ years of technical engineering experience with coding, or equivalent experience.
• 7+ years of experience building commercial-grade software, including mission-critical, large-scale, high-availability services or client platforms.
• Demonstrated experience setting technical direction and architecture for distributed systems, reusable platforms, or cross-app capabilities spanning multiple services, platforms, or engineering teams.
• Experience owning ambiguous engineering problems end to end, from investigation and architecture through implementation, production launch, measurement, and sustained operation.
• Deep expertise in performance, scalability, reliability, and efficiency engineering, using telemetry, profiling, benchmarking, experimentation, or production diagnostics to guide decisions and measurable improvements.
• Demonstrated ability to create technical leverage through shared frameworks, APIs, tools, automation, and engineering patterns that help Office app teams build cohesive, app-specific AI experiences.
• Experience with large-scale AI-powered products, including grounding, orchestration, evaluation, reliability, privacy, or cost considerations.
• Experience applying agents, automation, or AI-driven analysis to improve product experiences or engineering workflows, with sound responsible AI practices.
• Demonstrated technical leadership across disciplines, including architectural alignment, engineering standards, clear technical communication, and mentoring senior engineers.

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.