Senior Forward Deployed Engineer

Scale what works

Deliver measurable adoption outcomes

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.

Preferred Qualifications

• Production experience building or deploying systems powered by large language models (LLMs) — agent development, prompt and context engineering, evaluation frameworks, tool and MCP integration, and deployment at scale.
• Solid programming ability in Python and at least one of TypeScript, C#, Rust, Go, C or C++, with a record of shipping production software.
• Experience in a customer-facing engineering role — forward deployed engineering, field engineering, technical consulting, escalation engineering, solutions architecture, or as a technical founder — working directly with another organization's engineers in their environment.
• Technical knowledge of the Windows developer platform, including several of: Windows Subsytem for Linus (WSL), containers and virtualization, developer environment and configuration, toolchain and build performance, local inference and hardware acceleration, and the security and policy controls that shape developer machines in an enterprise.
• Experience diagnosing performance and reliability problems using structured methods — telemetry, traces, profiling, Windows Performance Analyzer or comparable tooling — in systems you did not write.
• Demonstrated ability to turn a solution built for one customer into something repeatable that benefits many.
• Experience representing customer needs in product planning and shifting engineering priorities using technical evidence and business impact.
• High agency and comfort with ambiguity — this team does not yet have a playbook, and the first people here will write it.
• The judgement and emotional intelligence to hold a hard conversation with a customer without losing the relationship or the truth.
• Familiarity with the Windows app platform — WinUI, WPF, .NET desktop — and with application modernization. Not required for this role, but valuable when a customer's adoption conversation turns to their existing app estate.
• Evidence of learning hard things fast. We do not expect anyone to arrive with every skill listed here. A solid track record of acquiring depth quickly counts as much as depth you already have.
• #W+DJOBS
• 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.