Principal Software Engineer, Salesforce & Data

Salesforce; New York (NY); On-site; USD 197,300 - 344,700; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Time off programs

Medical, dental, and vision coverage

401(k) and employee stock purchasing program

Job summary

Salesforce is seeking a Principal Member of Technical Staff to drive innovation in AI and data engineering within its customer platforms. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience in software engineering and enterprise integrations.

You will be integral in defining technical strategies and building scalable systems that leverage Salesforce technologies. Strong experience with Python, SQL, and a grasp of the latest AI tools are essential. This role offers a chance to lead and mentor within a dynamic engineering ecosystem.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of experience across software engineering, platform engineering, or data engineering.
• Strong hands-on experience with Salesforce technologies including Apex and MuleSoft.
• Deep expertise in Python and SQL, including distributed data processing.

Responsibilities

• Define technical strategy for Salesforce CRM and AI-enabled initiatives.
• Architect and build large-scale applications using Salesforce Core.
• Design and implement enterprise data products and data pipelines.

Skills

Software engineering

Data engineering

AI expertise

Python

SQL

APIs

Salesforce technologies

Education

12+ years of relevant experience

Tools

Apex

MuleSoft

Heroku

Data Cloud (Data360)

Job description

Software Engineering

Job Category: Software Engineering

About Salesforce

Salesforce is the #1 AI CRM, where humans with agents drive customer success together. Here, ambition meets action. Tech meets trust. And innovation isn’t a buzzword – it’s a way of life. The world of work as we know it is changing and we’re looking for Trailblazers who are passionate about bettering business and the world through AI, driving innovation, and keeping Salesforce’s core values at the heart of it all.

The Experience

Salesforce is building the next generation of intelligent customer and business platforms by combining CRM, enterprise data, automation, and AI. As part of this vision, we are investing in a unified engineering ecosystem that spans Salesforce applications, Data 360, customer data platforms, enterprise integrations, and AI‑powered developer experiences.

We are seeking a highly motivated, hands‑on Principal Member of Technical Staff (PMTS) who brings a rare combination of software engineering, data engineering, and AI expertise. This role is ideal for a technical leader who can seamlessly operate across CRM applications, enterprise integrations, data platforms, and modern AI‑powered development environments.

You will help define the technical strategy for critical business capabilities while building scalable systems that connect transactional applications with enterprise data platforms. Just as importantly, you will be a force multiplier for engineering productivity by leveraging modern AI development platforms to accelerate software delivery and developer efficiency.

What You’ll Actually Be Doing

• Define and drive technical strategy across Salesforce CRM, Data 360, enterprise data platforms, and AI‑enabled engineering initiatives.
• Architect and build large‑scale applications using Salesforce Core, Apex, Lightning Platform, MuleSoft, Heroku, APIs, and cloud‑native services.
• Design and implement enterprise data products, data pipelines, and data services supporting customer, account, marketing, and operational use cases.
• Build scalable integrations between Salesforce applications, Data 360, Snowflake, enterprise data warehouses, and external systems using APIs, streaming, and event‑driven architectures.
• Design and develop AI‑powered engineering accelerators, developer tools, code generation frameworks, testing automation solutions, and operational tooling using Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, GitHub Copilot, and agentic AI technologies.
• Partner closely with Product Managers, Architects, Data Engineers, and Software Engineers to define platform roadmaps and long‑term architectural direction.
• Drive the design of highly scalable data processing frameworks leveraging Airflow, Python, SQL, streaming technologies, CDC patterns, and modern cloud‑native architectures.
• Establish engineering standards for data quality, observability, platform reliability, governance, and operational excellence.
• Mentor senior engineers and provide technical leadership across multiple teams and business domains.
• Lead complex production investigations spanning applications, integrations, data pipelines, and platform services.

You’re Our Person If…

• 12+ years of experience across software engineering, platform engineering, data engineering, or enterprise application development.
• Strong hands‑on experience building applications on Salesforce technologies including Apex, Lightning Platform, CRM, APIs, MuleSoft, and Heroku.
• Strong experience building enterprise‑scale data platforms, data products, data pipelines, and data‑intensive applications.
• Deep expertise in Python, SQL, distributed data processing, orchestration frameworks, and modern data engineering practices.
• Experience designing and operating large‑scale ETL/ELT pipelines using Airflow or similar orchestration technologies.
• Proven experience integrating application platforms with enterprise data ecosystems using APIs, streaming technologies, event‑driven architectures, and cloud‑native services.
• Demonstrated experience building AI‑powered developer tools, engineering productivity platforms, or software delivery accelerators using modern AI platforms such as Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, GitHub Copilot, or equivalent technologies.
• Strong understanding of Generative AI, agentic workflows, MCP frameworks, and practical applications of AI within enterprise software engineering organizations.
• Ability to influence technical direction across multiple teams and organizations while remaining deeply hands‑on.
• Proven ability to take complex technical initiatives from concept through production deployment.

Even Better If…

• Experience with Salesforce Data Cloud (Data360), Customer 360, Identity Resolution, Data Modeling, Segmentation, Activations, or Customer Data Platforms.
• Experience building marketing technology, personalization, customer engagement, or campaign management applications.
• Experience with Snowflake, Databricks, Kafka, CDC frameworks, and modern cloud data platforms.
• Experience building customer identity, profile, account hierarchy, master data, or knowledge graph solutions.
• Experience with Retrieval‑Augmented Generation (RAG), vector databases, AI agents, semantic search, or AI‑native application architectures.
• Experience building internal developer platforms, engineering productivity systems, CI/CD automation, or product engineering solutions.
• Experience working across both application engineering and data engineering domains at enterprise scale.

Compensation and Benefits

In the United States, compensation offered will be determined by factors such as location, job level, job‑related knowledge, skills, and experience. Certain roles may be eligible for incentive compensation, equity, and benefits. Salesforce offers a variety of benefits to help you live well including: time off programs, medical, dental, vision, mental health support, paid parental leave, life and disability insurance, 401(k), and an employee stock purchasing program. More details about company benefits can be found at https://www.salesforcebenefits.com. Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance and the Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring, Salesforce will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records. At Salesforce, we believe in equitable compensation practices that reflect the dynamic nature of labor markets across various regions. The typical base salary range for this position is $197,300 – $313,700 annually. In select cities within the San Francisco and New York City metropolitan area, the base salary range for this role is $237,700 – $344,700 annually. The range represents base salary only, and does not include company bonus, incentive for sales roles, equity or benefits, as applicable.

Equal Opportunity Statement

Salesforce is an equal‑opportunity employer and maintains a policy of non‑discrimination with all employees and applicants for employment. What does that mean exactly? It means that at Salesforce, we believe in equality for all. And we believe we can lead the path to equality in part by creating a workplace that’s inclusive, and free from discrimination. Any employee or potential employee will be assessed on the basis of merit, competence 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 classifications protected by law. This policy applies to current and prospective employees, no matter where they are in their Salesforce employment journey. It also applies to recruiting, hiring, job assignment, compensation, promotion, benefits, training, assessment of job performance, discipline, termination, and everything in between. Recruiting, hiring, and promotion decisions at Salesforce are fair and based on merit. The same goes for compensation, benefits, promotions, transfers, reduction in workforce, recall, training, and education.