Principal Engineer, Hybrid Cloud Environment

Google; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 307,000 - 427,000; Full time

Job summary

Google is seeking a Principal Engineer and Unified Tech Lead for the Hybrid Cloud Environment (HCE) team to own the technical direction and multi-year roadmap for the platform. The role requires guiding an engineering organization and bridging traditional developer ecosystems with Google Cloud Platform to deliver secure, scalable cloud environments.

You will work with the Core team to advance centralized infrastructure, developer platforms, and product components, influencing architectural

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in CS or related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 15 years of software engineering with cloud infrastructure and policy engines.
• Experience leading senior engineering teams and defining multi-year architecture strategies.

Responsibilities

• Define compiler translating natural-language intent and decorators into secure cloud environments.
• Lead design of the control plane ensuring zero-trust identity with automated compliance.
• Mentor staff and senior staff engineers to cultivate the next generation of technical leaders.
• Represent engineering standards across Google and collaborate to drive GCP adoption.

Skills

Technical leadership

Architectural strategy

Distributed cloud infrastructure

Executive communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

AI platforms

Prompt engineering systems

Cloud Platform solutions

Job description

In accordance with Washington state law, we are highlighting our comprehensive benefits package, which is available to all eligible US based employees. Benefits for this role include:

• Health, dental, vision, life, disability insurance
• Retirement Benefits: 401(k) with company match
• Paid Time Off: 20 days of vacation per year, accruing at a rate of 6.15 hours per pay period for the first five years of employment
• Sick Time: 40 hours/year (increased to 69 hours/year for Seattle) including 5 discretionary sick days per instance
• Maternity Leave (Short-Term Disability + Baby Bonding): 28-30 weeks
• Baby Bonding Leave: 18 weeks
• Holidays: 13 paid days per year

Note: By applying to this position you will have an opportunity to share your preferred working location from the following:

San Jose, CA, USA; Kirkland, WA, USA; New York, NY, USA; Zürich, Switzerland; Munich, Germany

Minimum qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, a related technical field, or equivalent practical experience.
• 15 years of experience in software engineering, with a focus on designing, building, and operating large-scale, distributed cloud infrastructure, policy engines, or control planes.
• Experience in a technical leadership role leading senior engineering teams and defining multi-year architectural strategies.

Preferred qualifications

• Experience with AI application platforms, prompt engineering systems, or orchestrating agentic workflows.
• Deep familiarity with developer infrastructure and Cloud Platform solutions.
• Exceptional executive communication and influence skills, with a proven ability to lead across organizational boundaries and align executive-level priorities.
• Track record of designing compilers, policy engines, or domain-specific languages that compile high-level configurations or intents into secure cloud configurations.

About The Job

As the Principal Engineer and Unified Tech Lead (UTL) for the Hybrid Cloud Environment (HCE) team, you will act as the primary technical authority for our organization, owning the technical direction and multi-year roadmap for the Hybrid Cloud Environment platform, establishing an automated and secure cloud infrastructure plane across Google.

The Hybrid Cloud Environment represents a paradigm shift in how enterprise software systems and developers interact with cloud infrastructure, drawing strong parallels to major multi-cloud and SaaS architectural modernizations across the industry.

The platform compiles natural-language developer intent and declarative governance directly into secure, compliant, and highly scalable cloud environments. By delivering a single-call instantiation pattern the platform abstracts away the massive operational friction of cloud resource provisioning (e.g., IAM, VPC Service Controls, BeyondCorp, and Cloud DLP). Your mission is to make safe, governed cloud environment creation the path of least resistance across the company-allowing both human engineers and autonomous AI agents to stand up real, enterprise-grade cloud environments in seconds. You will guide an engineering organization, bridging the gap between traditional developer ecosystems (Google3, etc.) and Google Cloud Platform (GCP).

The Core team builds the technical foundation behind Google's flagship products. We are owners and advocates for the underlying design elements, developer platforms, product components, and infrastructure at Google. These are the essential building blocks for excellent, safe, and coherent experiences for our users and drive the pace of innovation for every developer. We look across Google’s products to build central solutions, break down technical barriers and strengthen existing systems. As the Core team, we have a mandate and a unique opportunity to impact important technical decisions across the company.

Individual pay is determined by factors including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training.

Germany: €232000 - €237000 (EUR) + 30% bonus target + equity + benefits

US: $307000 - $427000 (USD) + 30% bonus target + equity + benefits

Responsibilities

Learn more about benefits at Google .

• Define the compiler translating natural-language intent and decorators (including residency and budget) into secure cloud environments, establishing a reference implementation with a federated registry. Host autonomous AI agents operating under strictly bounded, non-amplifiable credentials.
• Lead the design of the control plane ensuring zero-trust identity using short-lived credentials integrated with Google's identity plane and Sigstore attestations. Employ automated drift pipelines, reaper protocols, and CVE controllers to eliminate manual compliance tickets.
• Mentor staff and senior staff engineers to cultivate the next generation of technical leaders, fostering an AI-fluent culture of rapid, safe iteration. Represent engineering standards across Google.
• Represent the organization across Core and Product Areas to arbitrate complex disputes. Collaborate across boundaries to establish a safe adoption ratchet, driving organic GCP adoption.

Google is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. See also Google's EEO Policy and EEO is the Law. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know by completing our Accommodations for Applicants form .