Cloud operations are entering a new era. COSMIC is building agentic infrastructure that helps engineers define goals, policies, and operational intent while autonomous systems safely execute routine work across Microsoft’s largest Kubernetes fleets.
Part of M365 Substrate Core, COSMIC is modernizing Microsoft’s compute platform with turn-key geo-presence, security, high availability, fault isolation, and automated cloud buildout, improving service agility, reliability, compliance, and cost efficiency.
Job Purpose
We are seeking a Senior Software Engineer to build autonomous operational capabilities for COSMIC.
You will own significant features and services that enable AI agents to coordinate and safely execute operational workflows at fleet scale, including deployment, capacity, resiliency, recovery, optimization, evaluation, and continuous learning.
Working with product managers, architects, and engineers across COSMIC, you will take problems from design through production, make sound technical decisions, use production signals to improve the system, and help other engineers succeed through technical leadership.
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.
Responsibilities
- Own the design, implementation, rollout, and operation of significant COSMIC App Platform features and services from requirements through production.
- Build distributed platform and orchestration components that enable AI agents to coordinate and execute deployment, capacity, resiliency, recovery, and optimization workflows at fleet scale.
- Design safety boundaries including sandbox isolation, scoped identity and access, policy and approval checks, auditable execution, rollback, blast-radius containment, and human oversight.
- Drive production readiness through health-gated releases, observability, alerts, runbooks, on-call support, and incident follow-up.
- Build evaluation, experimentation, feedback, and learning loops with measurable system-quality and operational outcomes.
- Translate customer and operational needs into sound designs, testable software, and clear success criteria while resolving cross-team dependencies and delivering end-to-end scenarios.
- Investigate complex production issues using telemetry and data, identify root causes, and deliver durable fixes that improve reliability and supportability.
- Lead feature-level technical reviews, contribute to architecture and roadmap decisions, mentor engineers through design and code reviews, and improve reusable engineering patterns and tooling.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science or related technical field AND 4+ years technical engineering experience with coding in languages including, but not limited to, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, or Python or Rust.
Other Requirements:
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.
- Master'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 Bachelor'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 equivalent experience.
- Experience designing, building, and operating distributed systems, cloud services, or Kubernetes-based infrastructure.
- Experience owning complex features or services from design through production, including reliability, instrumentation, and supportability.
- Experience with production AI or agent systems, workflow orchestration, control planes, or intelligent automation.
- Experience implementing safety, policy, identity, authorization, observability, evaluation, or approval mechanisms for automated systems.
- Solid coding, debugging, testing, and systems design skills, with attention to maintainability and operational quality.
- Experience using telemetry, experiments, and customer feedback to improve product and system outcomes.
- Ability to communicate technical decisions clearly and collaborate effectively across engineering and product disciplines.
Software Engineering IC4 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $119,800 - $234,700 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 $160,200 - $261,000 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.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or a related technical field
- 4+ years of technical engineering experience
- Coding experience in languages including C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Python, or Rust
- Ability to meet Microsoft Cloud Background Check and applicable customer or government security screening requirements
- Master's degree in Computer Science or a related technical field and 6+ years of technical engineering experience, or bachelor's degree and 8+ years of experience, or equivalent experience
- Experience designing, building, and operating distributed systems, cloud services, or Kubernetes-based infrastructure
- Experience owning complex features or services through design, production, reliability, instrumentation, and supportability
- Experience with production AI or agent systems, workflow orchestration, control planes, or intelligent automation
- Experience implementing safety, policy, identity, authorization, observability, evaluation, or approval mechanisms for automated systems
- Strong coding, debugging, testing, and systems design skills
- Experience using telemetry, experiments, and customer feedback to improve product and system outcomes
- Ability to communicate technical decisions clearly and collaborate across engineering and product disciplines
Microsoft Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Microsoft and has not been reviewed or approved by Microsoft.
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Healthcare Strength — Health coverage is described as comprehensive, with preventive care coverage, vision options, and annual out-of-pocket limits. Feedback suggests medical, mental-health, and disability support are a major strength of the package.
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Parental & Family Support — Family support is expansive, including parental leave, family caregiver leave, child-care assistance, family concierge services, fertility options, and college-advising support for eligible employees. Feedback suggests these benefits meaningfully ease caregiving and family planning demands.
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Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — Wellbeing resources include counseling and employee-assistance services, wellness reimbursements, product discounts, and charitable-matching programs. Feedback suggests these extras complement core benefits and support day-to-day quality of life.
Microsoft Insights
What We Do
At Microsoft, our mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Our mission is grounded in both the world in which we live and the future we strive to create. Today, we live in a mobile-first, cloud-first world, and the transformation we are driving across our businesses is designed to enable Microsoft and our customers to thrive in this world.
