Salesforce
Principal Software Engineer, Data Platform
Salesforce, San Francisco, California, United States, 94199
Principal Software Engineer, Data Platform
We are looking for a Principal Member of Technical Staff for the Enterprise Data Platform to modernize, integrate, and optimize Salesforce's foundational data ecosystem. You will be the technical "north star" for the engineering teams, bridging modern distributed analytics with the cutting edge of Semantic AI.
In this high‑impact individual contributor role, you will architect the backbone of the company using technologies such as Snowflake, dbt, Informatica, Airflow, Neo4j, and TopQuadrant. Your mission is to design a seamless path from structured data into high‑value knowledge graphs to power BI, Advanced Analytics, and Generative AI. You will write proof‑of‑concepts, set code standards, and solve complex scalability challenges.
Key Responsibilities
Architect the Roadmap: Define the long‑term technical architecture for the Enterprise Data Platform and translate business strategy into technical specifications, ensuring Data Mesh scalability and domain‑oriented ownership.
Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Evangelism: Architect and review Terraform/Helm configurations that define our infrastructure, ensuring it is immutable, version‑controlled, and reproducible.
Performance Engineering: Deep dive into performance bottlenecks and optimize query planners, data serialization formats (Parquet/Iceberg), and distributed compute costs across Snowflake and Spark.
AI Enablement: Design integration patterns for AI‑assisted tooling (Cursor, MCP, Copilot) within the developer workflow.
Graph RAG Architecture: Lead the technical design of “Graph RAG” (Retrieval‑Augmented Generation), enabling LLM agents to query structured Snowflake data via Neo4j Knowledge Graph.
Semantic Layer Design: Design the integration between Snowflake and TopQuadrant/TopBraid EDG, enforcing ontologies mechanically rather than theoretically.
Polyglot Persistence: Define architectural patterns for data residency in Snowflake versus Neo4j and design high‑velocity pipelines (Kafka/Airflow) that keep them in sync.
Code Quality & DevOps: Set the standard for code quality, review pull requests, and enforce strict CI/CD pipelines (unit testing data, schema validation).
Resiliency Architecture: Design self‑healing systems, monitoring, and alerting frameworks (SRE) that ensure 99.9% availability for critical pipelines.
Mentorship without Authority: Act as a technical mentor to Senior and Lead engineers across squads, elevating the technical bar through design reviews, RFCs, and pair programming.
What We’re Looking For
10+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 5 years focused on backend distributed systems or data infrastructure at scale.
Expert in Python, Java, or Go with strong debugging, performance tuning, and query optimization skills.
Proven track record of designing large‑scale data platforms. Deep understanding of CAP theorem, eventual consistency, and batch vs streaming trade‑offs.
Hands‑on expertise of Snowflake, dbt, Airflow, and Tableau.
Deep knowledge of graph databases (Neo4j Cypher) and modeling, with focus on avoiding super‑node problems and optimizing traversals.
Mastery of AWS or GCP (IAM, VPC, PrivateLink, storage, Kubernetes/EKS).
Experience implementing RAG architectures, vector databases, or integrating LLMs into data pipelines.
Strong influence & communication skills with ability to author RFCs and ADRs that drive consensus.
Benefits When you join Salesforce, you’ll benefit from comprehensive health, dental, vision, mental health support, paid parental leave, life and disability insurance, 401(k), employee stock purchasing program, and other perks. Benefits details can be found at salesforcebenefits.com.
Accommodations If you require assistance due to a disability applying for open positions, please submit a request via the Accommodations Request Form.
Posting Statement Salesforce is an equal opportunity employer and maintains a policy of non‑discrimination with all employees and applicants for employment. We make hiring, promotion, and other decisions based on merit and qualifications without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity, transgender status, age, disability, veteran or marital status, political viewpoint, or other protected classifications.
Salary The typical base salary range for this position is $211,500 – $306,600 annually. In select cities within the San Francisco and New York City metropolitan areas, the base salary range is $230,800 – $334,600 annually. The range represents base salary only and does not include bonuses, equity, or benefits.
#J-18808-Ljbffr
In this high‑impact individual contributor role, you will architect the backbone of the company using technologies such as Snowflake, dbt, Informatica, Airflow, Neo4j, and TopQuadrant. Your mission is to design a seamless path from structured data into high‑value knowledge graphs to power BI, Advanced Analytics, and Generative AI. You will write proof‑of‑concepts, set code standards, and solve complex scalability challenges.
Key Responsibilities
Architect the Roadmap: Define the long‑term technical architecture for the Enterprise Data Platform and translate business strategy into technical specifications, ensuring Data Mesh scalability and domain‑oriented ownership.
Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Evangelism: Architect and review Terraform/Helm configurations that define our infrastructure, ensuring it is immutable, version‑controlled, and reproducible.
Performance Engineering: Deep dive into performance bottlenecks and optimize query planners, data serialization formats (Parquet/Iceberg), and distributed compute costs across Snowflake and Spark.
AI Enablement: Design integration patterns for AI‑assisted tooling (Cursor, MCP, Copilot) within the developer workflow.
Graph RAG Architecture: Lead the technical design of “Graph RAG” (Retrieval‑Augmented Generation), enabling LLM agents to query structured Snowflake data via Neo4j Knowledge Graph.
Semantic Layer Design: Design the integration between Snowflake and TopQuadrant/TopBraid EDG, enforcing ontologies mechanically rather than theoretically.
Polyglot Persistence: Define architectural patterns for data residency in Snowflake versus Neo4j and design high‑velocity pipelines (Kafka/Airflow) that keep them in sync.
Code Quality & DevOps: Set the standard for code quality, review pull requests, and enforce strict CI/CD pipelines (unit testing data, schema validation).
Resiliency Architecture: Design self‑healing systems, monitoring, and alerting frameworks (SRE) that ensure 99.9% availability for critical pipelines.
Mentorship without Authority: Act as a technical mentor to Senior and Lead engineers across squads, elevating the technical bar through design reviews, RFCs, and pair programming.
What We’re Looking For
10+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 5 years focused on backend distributed systems or data infrastructure at scale.
Expert in Python, Java, or Go with strong debugging, performance tuning, and query optimization skills.
Proven track record of designing large‑scale data platforms. Deep understanding of CAP theorem, eventual consistency, and batch vs streaming trade‑offs.
Hands‑on expertise of Snowflake, dbt, Airflow, and Tableau.
Deep knowledge of graph databases (Neo4j Cypher) and modeling, with focus on avoiding super‑node problems and optimizing traversals.
Mastery of AWS or GCP (IAM, VPC, PrivateLink, storage, Kubernetes/EKS).
Experience implementing RAG architectures, vector databases, or integrating LLMs into data pipelines.
Strong influence & communication skills with ability to author RFCs and ADRs that drive consensus.
Benefits When you join Salesforce, you’ll benefit from comprehensive health, dental, vision, mental health support, paid parental leave, life and disability insurance, 401(k), employee stock purchasing program, and other perks. Benefits details can be found at salesforcebenefits.com.
Accommodations If you require assistance due to a disability applying for open positions, please submit a request via the Accommodations Request Form.
Posting Statement Salesforce is an equal opportunity employer and maintains a policy of non‑discrimination with all employees and applicants for employment. We make hiring, promotion, and other decisions based on merit and qualifications without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity, transgender status, age, disability, veteran or marital status, political viewpoint, or other protected classifications.
Salary The typical base salary range for this position is $211,500 – $306,600 annually. In select cities within the San Francisco and New York City metropolitan areas, the base salary range is $230,800 – $334,600 annually. The range represents base salary only and does not include bonuses, equity, or benefits.
#J-18808-Ljbffr