Principal Software Engineer (Santa Clara)

Company DescriptionIt all started when engineer Fred Luddy wrote code that automated a tedious task for his coworker, Phyllis. She cried tears of joy. That moment inspired Fred to build a company that could do that for everyone—freeing people from busywork so they could focus on meaningful work. Today, ServiceNow is the AI control tower for business reinvention. Our ServiceNow AI platform brings together any AI, any data, and any workflow— helping 85% of the Fortune 500 work smarter, faster, and better. We're building an AI-native culture where technology and talent are unstoppable together. And we're just getting started.Join us to put AI to work for people.Job DescriptionPrincipal Software EngineerThe engineering organization is a dynamic group of builders, thinkers, and problem-solvers focused on delivering scalable, AI-powered software products that improve how organizations work. We value clean architecture, intuitive experiences, operational excellence, and a culture of continuous improvement. Every engineer plays an important role in shaping the quality, reliability, and long-term success of our products. About the Team: The Service Operations Business Unit brings together IT Service Management (ITSM), IT Operations Management (ITOM), and CMDB capabilities on the ServiceNow Platform. This product engineering organization builds the software that helps customers deliver resilient, intelligent, and efficient enterprise services. The Service Operations product portfolio connects incident, request, fulfillment, infrastructure visibility, service mapping, trusted configuration data, automation, and AIOps into a unified operating model. By combining service delivery with operational intelligence and trusted operational context, these products help customers move toward proactive, AI-assisted, and increasingly self-healing operations at enterprise scale. Together, these capabilities help customers modernize how they deliver and operate services, improve reliability, reduce manual effort, and drive measurable productivity outcomes on a single platform. What you get to do in this role: As a Principal Software Engineer, you will architect and build assistive and autonomous AI-native products to usher customers (IT departments using our IT service and operation management applications) into an agentic-first era. The work will span large-scale distributed systems, data ingestion, context creation and utilization, agentic harnesses, cost optimization, agentic feedback loops to ensure value realization for our customers. This role requires thought leadership, deep technical expertise, strong architectural judgment, and a keen understanding of the scientific method to ship and refine real product through iterative experimentation. Responsibilities include:• Lead architecture and technical strategy for assigned problem areas within ITSM/ITOM products, working with product and engineering leaders to understand blockers and opportunities around AI-native evolution and value realization. • Contribute hands-on to spiking and shipping solutions. Validate architectural hypotheses through code, not theory. Build prototypes, reference implementations, and critical path components to prove feasibility and guide teams. • Design and validate solutions through evidence-based spiking: formulate hypotheses, run experiments, measure outcomes, and use data to guide architectural decisions and product direction. • Architect the evolution of current solutions toward AI-native capabilities—identifying where agentic patterns, data utilization, or autonomous workflows can unlock customer value. Translate architectural recommendations into executable work. • Identify and address value realization gaps in agentic products that exist but aren't delivering expected outcomes. Work with teams to diagnose root causes (architecture, UX, data quality, feedback loops, cost) and recommend targeted improvements. • Establish architecture patterns and best practices specific to your problem domain. Document tradeoffs, rationale, and implementation guidance to help teams move faster and make consistent decisions. • Guide teams through complex technical decisions and design reviews. Challenge assumptions with data, surface architectural risks early, and help teams navigate tradeoffs between shipping speed and long-term durability. • Collaborate across ITSM/ITOM engineering teams to share learnings, validate approaches, and accelerate adoption of patterns that work. QualificationsTo be successful in this role, you have: 15+ years of related engineering experience, or equivalent practical experience. Strong experience building and operating large-scale distributed systems, enterprise platforms, workflow systems, data-intensive products, integration frameworks, or cloud-scale infrastructure. Deep understanding of system design for scale, reliability, observability, fault tolerance, data quality, security, and production readiness. Strong technical depth in Java, Python, or similar programming languages. Proven ability to define technical direction, influence architecture across teams, and translate ambiguous product strategy into executable engineering plans. Ability to operate as a Principal IC by leading through technical credibility, collaboration, and influence rather than formal authority. Strong judgment in balancing long-term architecture with pragmatic execution, customer impact, engineering velocity, and business priorities. Experience mentoring senior engineers, raising engineering standards, and building reusable patterns that create leverage across teams. Experience with AI-powered products, automation platforms, AI-assisted workflows, or agentic systems is strongly preferred. Ability to reason about AI-assisted enterprise workflows, including data quality, workflow correctness, evaluation, observability, safety controls, and human-in-the-loop review. Experience with enterprise service management, IT operations, CMDB, discovery, service mapping, AIOps, observability, workflow automation, endpoint management, or operational intelligence is a strong plus. Experience working with large-scale enterprise customers, production systems, and complex migration or modernization efforts is a plus. Why Join Us Shape the AI-native future of the Service Operations Business Unit product portfolio on the ServiceNow Platform. Build foundational product and platform capabilities that help enterprises deliver, operate, automate, and continuously improve services at scale. Define how AI agents, automation, operational data, and human workflows come together to create safer, more reliable, and more productive enterprise operations. Collaborate with teams that value craftsmanship, quality, innovation, accountability, and meaningful customer impact. For positions in this location, we offer a base pay of $221,200 - $387,100, plus equity (when applicable), variable/incentive compensation and benefits. Sales positions generally offer a competitive On Target Earnings (OTE) incentive compensation structure. Please note that the base pay shown is a guideline, and individual total compensation will vary based on factors such as qualifications, skill level, competencies, and work location. We also offer health plans, including flexible spending accounts, a 401(k) Plan with company match, ESPP, matching donations, a flexible time away plan and family leave programs. Compensation is based on the geographic location in which the role is located and is subject to change based on work location.Additional InformationWork PersonasWe approach our distributed world of work with flexibility and trust. Work personas (flexible, remote, or required in office) are categories that are assigned to ServiceNow employees depending on the nature of their work and their assigned work location. Learn more here. To determine eligibility for a work persona, ServiceNow may confirm the distance between your primary residence and the closest ServiceNow office using a third-party service.Equal Opportunity EmployerServiceNow is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, gender identity, veteran status, or any other category protected by law. In addition, all qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with legal requirements.  AccommodationsWe strive to create an accessible and inclusive experience for all candidates. If you require a reasonable accommodation to complete any part of the application process, or are unable to use this online application and need an alternative method to apply, please contact View email address on apply.placed-app.com for assistance. Export Control RegulationsFor positions requiring access to controlled technology subject to export control regulations, including the U.S. Export Administration Regulations (EAR), ServiceNow may be required to obtain export control approval from government authorities for certain individuals. All employment is contingent upon ServiceNow obtaining any export license or other approval that may be required by relevant export control authorities. From Fortune. 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All rights reserved. Used under license.SummaryType: Full-timeFunction: EngineeringExperience level: Not ApplicableIndustry: Information Technology And Services