Lead Principal Platform Software Engineer

About the role

At Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), we’re building the future of cloud for enterprises—powered by a diverse team of creators and innovators. We combine the agility of a startup with the scale and customer focus of a leading enterprise software company. Our values are the foundation of everything we do: equity, inclusion, and respect; doing the right thing for customers, colleagues, and community; and continuous learning, growth, and boundary-pushing innovation.

You’ll join a team of smart, motivated, and diverse engineers empowered with autonomy and support to do your best work. OCI offers a dynamic, flexible, and inclusive environment where your contributions matter.

As a Senior Principal Software Engineer IC5, you’ll provide technical leadership to the Identity and Access Management (IAM) team. You’ll design, build, and operate highly distributed, large-scale cloud services that are secure, reliable, and scalable. You will architect complex systems, write high-quality code, and mentor others across teams. Senior Principal engineers lead by example: you work independently, communicate effectively, and influence engineering direction through sound technical judgment. You balance speed and quality, proactively advocate for operational excellence, and raise the bar for design, testing, and delivery practices. You drive innovation, make data-informed decisions, and influence roadmaps across multiple teams.

Responsibilities

• Platform Software Development: Set group-wide guardrails for platform interoperability, security controls, and client library governance; own cross-group programs (e.g., identity, config, API gateway standards) with measurable reliability/performance impact; establish shared observability frameworks and rollout policies adopted by numerous teams; manage deprecation risk.
• Software Development and Coding – Design, Testing, and Optimization: Lead project initiatives to design software solutions and analyze requirements; write and define foundational code for new projects or prototypes; adhere to and improve execution of all phases of the software development lifecycle; coach engineers across teams to drive improvements; act as a subject-matter expert to develop and guide new software features and enhancements; lead process, architecture, and code reviews; utilize modern/emerging technologies to debug and troubleshoot highly complex issues; lead strategic initiatives to optimize software testing, quality assurance, error logging, monitoring, and observability; resolve complex API functionality and integration issues; implement API versioning, lifecycle, and interoperability strategies.
• Software Architecture – Software System Structural Design: Lead design and development of software, systems, and services; define and influence scope and architectural recommendations; provide technical guidance and mentorship; conduct complex periodic reviews and ensure adherence to architectural standards; collaborate with stakeholders to align architecture with business and customer goals; implement performance optimization and scalability strategies; research and evaluate technologies for architectural enhancements.
• Issue/Defect Collaboration – Software Products Support: Lead efforts to understand customer issues, root causes, and mitigation; provide expert technical guidance and support to customers; advocate for customers’ interests and suggest product enhancements; guide implementation of strategic solutions for customer issue and defect handling; investigate and troubleshoot the most complex product maintenance issues.
• Practices and Standards Compliance – Security and Compliance: Collaborate with security and leadership teams to establish and improve development practices and coding standards; participate in peer reviews and provide technical leadership; demonstrate and share expertise in industry best practices; implement secure software development practices and automated solutions to prevent vulnerabilities.
• Development Operations – System Maintenance: Lead periodic maintenance and testing operations for systems requiring upgrades or patching; drive improvements, ensure automation, testing, and debugging to maintain service/product availability, health, support, and reliability.
• Planning & Execution: Manage timelines, deliverables, and budgets for critical high-impact projects; anticipate and plan for resource or timeline shifts based on changing business priorities.
• Collaboration & Partnership: Influence cross-functional leaders and external stakeholders; foster partnerships with key business leaders and customers; champion transparency and inclusivity by incorporating diverse perspectives.
• Problem Solving: Lead specialized, advanced problem-solving efforts; serve as an escalation point for complex issues; guide others in using data-driven techniques to address ambiguous issues and drive solutions that prevent recurrence.
• Continuous Learning: Leverage deep industry knowledge to serve as a thought leader; contribute to advancement through presentations, white papers, or research; maintain expertise by monitoring trends and technologies; champion continuous learning and knowledge sharing.
• Continuous Improvement: Develop innovative solutions to increase efficiency and effectiveness of processes and workflows; evaluate effectiveness and design metrics to measure success.
• Performance and Development: Serve as a subject-matter expert regarding talent needs; impart leadership and expert knowledge in candidate interviews, assessments, and hiring decisions.

Requirements

• BS or MS degree in Computer Science or a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience
• 10+ years of software development experience
• Strong programming skills in Java, Go, C#, or other object-oriented languages
• Proven experience delivering high-scale, distributed services in a production environment
• Deep understanding of cloud infrastructure, networking, and system design
• Experience operating mission-critical, Tier-1 live services
• Excellent problem-solving, communication, and leadership skills
• Demonstrated ability to influence architectural direction and engineering best practices

Preferred Qualifications

• Domain expertise in Identity and Access Management (IAM)
• Experience building and operating services on public cloud platforms (OCI, AWS, Azure, etc.)
• Knowledge of multi-region deployments and multi-AD/AZ architectures
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines and test-driven development
• Familiarity with containerization technologies such as Docker
• Experience translating internal customer needs into prioritized features
• Knowledge of threat modeling, secure development practices, and compliance frameworks (FedRAMP, PCI DSS, etc.)
• Experience collaborating with large enterprise customers (tools, networks, etc.)

Pay

U.S. range: $96,800 – $306,400 per year. May be eligible for bonus, equity, and compensation deferral. Oracle maintains broad salary ranges to account for variations in knowledge, skills, experience, market conditions, locations, and product lines. Candidates are placed into the range based on preceding factors and internal peer equity.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance, including expert medical opinion
• Short-term and long-term disability
• Life insurance and AD&D; supplemental life insurance (Employee/Spouse/Child)
• Health care and dependent care Flexible Spending Accounts
• Pre-tax commuter and parking benefits
• 401(k) Savings and Investment Plan with company match
• Paid time off: Flexible Vacation for salaried employees; accrued vacation for others (13 days annually for first three years; 18 days thereafter for employees working ≥35 hours/week)