Principal Engineer, Palo Alto Networks
Software
$147-237.5k
More information about location
3 days a week in office
Leading cybersecurity protections and software platform
Be an early applicant
Leading cybersecurity protections and software platform
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
$147-237.5k
More information about location
3 days a week in office
1001+ employees
Company mission
To be the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life.
Role
Who you are
- 10+ years of experience in software engineering, with a demonstrable focus on DevOps, Developer Experience (DevEx), or Build/Tools/Platform Engineering
- Expert-level knowledge of CI/CD systems (e.g., GitLab CI, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, CircleCI) and build automation tools (e.g., Bazel, Gradle, Make, Webpack)
- Strong systems-level programming skills and experience with compiler-level optimization and performance profiling
- Deep experience with test automation frameworks and a strong understanding of the "test pyramid" and quality metrics
- Proficiency in at least one scripting language (e.g., Python, Go, Bash) and one compiled language (e.g., C++, Java, Rust, Go)
- Extensive experience with containerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure)
- A proven track record of leading complex, cross-functional projects and influencing other senior engineers without direct authority
- A "customer-first" mindset, where your "customers" are the other engineers in the company
- Preferred Qualifications
- Hands-on experience integrating generative AI tools (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Tabnine, or custom models) into a production engineering workflow
- Experience building and managing large-scale, polyglot, and/or microservice-based build systems
- Deep expertise in DevSecOps practices and automated security tooling
- Experience with observability platforms (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry) to monitor engineering system performance
What the job involves
- We are seeking a Principal Engineer to own and revolutionize our engineering velocity and developer experience
- This is a high-impact, cross-functional role designed to optimize the entire Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) from a developer's first line of code to production deployment
- You will be the principal architect and owner of the tools, processes, and systems that all other engineers at the company rely on
- Your core mission is to make our engineering team more productive, our systems more reliable, and our feedback loops faster
- A key strategic component of this role is the research, evaluation, and integration of AI-powered tools to create a step-function improvement in all aspects of our development
- 1. Build & Environment Local Development: Design, automate, and maintain a seamless, containerized local development environment to ensure developers can be productive within minutes
- Build Systems: Own and optimize all build scripts and infrastructure
- Your primary metrics for success will be reducing build time, minimizing cost, and achieving near-perfect reliability
- Dependency Management: Architect and automate our dependency management strategy to ensure secure, reproducible, and fast resolution of all third-party libraries
- 2. Performance & Security Performance Optimization: Drive deep technical optimizations at the compiler and architectural levels to improve application performance
- Implement and manage company-wide profiling tools and best practices
- Security Hardening: Embed security into the SDLC
- Integrate and manage Static Analysis (SAST) and other security tools within the build process to harden our applications from the ground up
- 3. Test & Quality Automation Test Automation Framework: Own the strategy and infrastructure for all test automation, including Unit, Component, Integration, and Functional tests
- Test Metrics: Define and report on key quality metrics, including Test Coverage, reliability (flakiness), and execution time
- Failure Triage: Act as the primary owner for build and test failures
- You will oversee the process of diagnosing failures, identifying the root cause, and ensuring the correct engineering team provides a timely fix
- 4.CI/CD & Reporting Deployment Automation: Own, simplify, and secure the Continuous Deployment (CD) pipeline, enabling engineering teams to release features safely, autonomously, and frequently
- Metrics & Reporting: Develop and maintain dashboards that provide clear visibility into engineering health, including code coverage, build times, test flakiness, and deployment frequency
- 5.AI Tooling Integration Strategic AI Implementation: Act as the team's subject matter expert on AI-driven development tools
- Prototyping & Integration: Continuously research, prototype, and integrate AI tooling to enhance all of the above responsibilities
- This includes, but is not limited to:AI-assisted code generation and refactoring
- Intelligent test case generation
- Automated bug detection and remediation
- AI-powered pipeline optimization and security analysis
Our take
With cyber threats evolving at lightening speed, businesses need robust solutions to protect their data and infrastructure. And the global cybersecurity market is projected to grow significantly, driven by increasing cyberattacks and the adoption of digital transformation initiatives. Because of this, companies are seeking security platforms that can address these challenges efficiently.
That's where Palo Alto Networks steps in, a frontrunner in the cybersecurity arena. It offers a suite of AI-powered security solutions designed to safeguard enterprises across various sectors. Its platforms, such as Cortex XSIAM and Prisma AIRS, integrate advanced threat detection, zero trust architecture, and real-time response capabilities so organizations are ready to manage and mitigate risks.
Its leadership is evident too, with impressive growth and strategic partnerships. Recently the company surpassed $1.5M in sales through the Google Cloud Marketplace, highlighting the demand for its innovative security solutions. Additionally, a collaboration with AT&T aims to enhance cybersecurity offerings, further solidifying its position in the market.
Freddie
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Company
Funding (2 rounds)
Sep 2022
$34m
SERIES A
May 2022
$11m
SEED
Total funding: $45m
Company benefits
- Healthcare: We value your health and provide options so you can choose what best supports your lifestyle and personal health goals. Various nationwide plans — including Blue Shield of California, Kaiser Permanente, Delta Dental, VSP, and more — are available to you and your family. Our providers offer the flexibility you want and the coverage you need
- Wellness: With a large on-site gym and daily, instructor-led exercise classes at HQ in Santa Clara, Palo Alto Networks actively supports employee fitness. Our juice bar, Gym & Juice, features fresh juice blends, a quick and nutritious option pre- or post-workout. And our ongoing wellness speaker series highlights the latest trends in health and wellness
- Development: Professional development is serious business at Palo Alto Networks, where the Talent Development team offers 25+ courses to help employees boost their careers and develop leadership capability
- Financial: Most roles are eligible for equity grants, and we now offer new hires a quarterly vesting schedule right away. We want you to be fairly compensated and rewarded as soon as you make an impact – on our team, that happens immediately! And because we consider every employee a stakeholder in our long-term success, we offer an Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) with a 24-month lookback. From life insurance to health savings accounts, we provide ways to help you protect and grow your wealth. Palo Alto Networks offers both traditional and Roth 401(k) options, along with a company match of 50% to a max annual amount of $1,000
- Time Off: In addition to paid corporate holidays, Flexible Time Off programs empower our employees to balance their work schedules with personal time off. We offer 12 weeks of full pay for medical leave and 6 weeks of full pay for parental leave. As a company with strong ties to the military and veterans, we also offer 26 weeks of full pay for military leave
- Perks: Our corporate discount program provides employees with significant discounts on merchandise, travel and entertainment. We offer many on-site perks at headquarters, including cafeterias, fuel service, dry cleaning service, EV charging stations, and a company store. We also provide complimentary drinks, fresh fruit, and snacks in break rooms across our campus to help everyone power through the day. Life at Palo Alto Network
Company HQ
Santa Clara, CA
Leadership
Nikesh Arora
(CEO & Chairman)Previously the President and COO at SoftBank, CBO at Google, and CMO at T-Mobile.
Nir Zuk
(Founder & CTO)Previously CTO at NetScreen Technologies, which was acquired by Juniper Neworks in 2004. They also co-founded OneSecure where they served as CTO and was the Principal Engineer at Check Point Software Technologies.
Lee Klarich
(CPO)Initially joined Palo Alto in 2006 as the EVP of Product Management and became CPO in 2018. Prior to this, they were the Director of Product Management at Juniper Networks and a Product Line Manager at NetScreen Technologies.
Salary benchmarks
We don't have enough data yet to provide salary benchmarks for this role.
Submit your salary to help other candidates with crowdsourced salary estimates.
Share this job
View 38 more jobs at Palo Alto Networks