Senior Principal Engineer - Platform Engineering
$288k - $345k USD
Fastly helps people stay better connected with the things they love. Fastly’s edge cloud platform enables customers to create great digital experiences quickly, securely, and reliably by processing, serving, and securing our customers’ applications as close to their end-users as possible — at the edge of the Internet. The platform is designed to take advantage of the modern internet, to be programmable, and to support agile software development. Fastly’s customers include many of the world’s most prominent companies, including GitHub, Yelp, Paramount, and JetBlue.
We're building a more trustworthy Internet. Come join us.
Posting Open Date: Feb 23, 2026
Anticipated Posting Close Date*: March 23, 2026
*Job posting may close early due to the volume of applicants.
Senior Principal Engineer, Platform Engineering
Fastly’s Platform Engineering team builds the foundations that enable engineers to ship quickly, safely, and reliably at scale. As a Senior Principal Engineer, you will set technical direction and lead cross‑organizational initiatives that strengthen our platform, developer experience, and operational excellence. You’ll partner closely with Engineering peers to remove friction, standardize best practices, and deliver paved roads that accelerate product teams. This is a highly cross‑functional and hands-on role representing the Platform Engineering org, reporting to the Senior Director of Engineering.
What You'll Do:
- Lead architecture and technical direction for Platform Engineering initiatives spanning build, deploy, runtime, observability, Security and developer experience
- Partner with Engineering, SRE, Security, and Product teams to align roadmaps, priorities, and success metrics across the company
- Drive cross‑org programs from concept to delivery (e.g., service templates/golden paths, CI/CD modernization, reliability and cost efficiency improvements)
- Define and evolve platform standards (APIs, operational readiness, SLOs/SLAs, incident learnings) and ensure adoption through tooling and enablement
- Mentor and amplify senior engineers and tech leads; raise the bar for design reviews, technical writing, and engineering rigor
- Communicate progress, risks, and decisions clearly to stakeholders and leadership; represent Platform Engineering in technical forums
What We're Looking For:
- 12+ years of related professional software engineering experience, including designing and operating distributed systems in production
- Demonstrated success leading complex, cross‑functional technical initiatives with broad organizational impact
- Deep expertise in at least two of: cloud infrastructure, Kubernetes/container platforms, CI/CD systems, networking/service connectivity, observability, security, developer tooling
- Strong systems design and architecture skills with a pragmatic approach to tradeoffs, risk management, and incremental delivery
- Excellent written and verbal communication; ability to influence without authority and align diverse stakeholders
- Commitment to building diverse and inclusive teams and an environment where engineers can do their best work
We’ll be super impressed if you have experience in any of these:
- Experience building internal developer platforms or “paved roads” at scale (e.g., service catalogs, self‑service infrastructure, standardized delivery pipelines)
- Background in high‑performance networking/edge/CDN systems or globally distributed traffic platforms
- Strong SRE practices: SLOs, error budgets, incident response, and continuous improvement loops
- Experience with infrastructure‑as‑code (e.g., Terraform), policy‑as‑code, and security automation
- Track record of driving adoption through enablement: docs, workshops, office hours, and partner engagement
Work Hours:
- This position will require you to be available during core business hours and occasional nights and weekends as needed for on call support
Work Location(s) & Travel Requirements:
The preferred hybrid locations for this position are:
- San Francisco, CA
- Denver, CO
- New York, NY
Fastly currently embraces a largely hybrid model for most roles which allows employees flexibility to split their time between the office and home.
We are also willing to consider highly qualified remote candidates in the United States.
This position will require travel as required by your manager.
Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance and the Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.
Salary:
The estimated salary range for this position is $287,570 to $345,084.
Starting salary may vary based on permissible, non-discriminatory factors such as experience, skills, qualifications, and location.
This role may be eligible to participate in Fastly’s equity and discretionary bonus programs.
Benefits:
We care about you. Fastly works hard to create a positive environment for our employees, and we think your life outside of work is important too. We support our teams with great benefits that start on the first day of your employment with Fastly. Curious about our offerings?
We offer a comprehensive benefits package including medical, dental, and vision insurance. Family planning, mental health support along with Employee Assistance Program, Insurance (Life, Disability, and Accident), a Flexible Vacation policy and up to 18 days of accrued paid sick leave are there to help support our employees. We also offer 401(k) (including company match) and an Employee Stock Purchase Program. For 2026, we offer 11 paid local holidays, 12 paid company wellness days.
Why Fastly?
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We have a huge impact. Fastly is a small company with a big reach. Not only do our customers have a tremendous user base, but we also support a growing number of open source projects and initiatives. Outside of code, employees are encouraged to share causes close to their heart with others so we can help lend a supportive hand.
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We value diversity. Growing and maintaining our inclusive and diverse team matters to us. We are committed to being a company where our employees feel comfortable bringing their authentic selves to work and have the ability to be successful -- every day.
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We are passionate. Fastly is chock full of passionate people and we’re not ‘one size fits all’. Fastly employs authors, pilots, skiers, parents (of humans and animals), makeup geeks, coffee connoisseurs, and more. We love employees for who they are and what they are passionate about.
We’re always looking for humble, sharp, and creative folks to join the Fastly team. If you think you might be a fit please apply! A fully completed application and resume or CV are required when applying.
All job applications must be submitted through our official careers site at www.fastly.com/about/careers. We will never request sensitive information, such as your Social Security number, bank account or credit card information during the application process. All official communication will come from an @fastly.com or @recruiting.fastly.com email address.
Fastly is committed to ensuring equal employment opportunity and to providing employees with a safe and welcoming work environment free of discrimination and harassment. Our employment decisions are based on business needs, job requirements and individual qualifications. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, family or parental status, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances.
Consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and federal or state disability laws, Fastly will provide reasonable accommodations for applicants and employees with disabilities. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact your Recruiter, or the Fastly Employee Relations team at candidateaccommodations@fastly.com or 501-287-4901.
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