Platform Engineer – Messaging

The Staff Platform Engineer – Microsoft 365 is a senior individual contributor responsible for the technical ownership, reliability, and strategic evolution of the Microsoft 365 platform. This role serves as the primary technical liaison with Microsoft and owns the end-to-end support model for M365 services across the enterprise. The position operates at a P4 (Staff) level, providing deep technical expertise, architectural leadership, and cross-team influence without direct people management responsibilities.

Key Responsibilities

Platform Ownership and Operations

• Own the overall health, availability, performance, and security of the Microsoft 365 platform, including but not limited to Exchange Online, Teams, SharePoint Online, OneDrive, Entra ID, Intune, and Purview.

• Define and maintain operational standards, support models, escalation paths, and runbooks for M365 services.

• Act as the highest-level technical escalation point for complex M365 incidents and systemic issues.

• Drive root cause analysis for major incidents and ensure sustainable corrective actions are implemented.

Microsoft Vendor Relationship

• Serve as the primary technical owner of the Microsoft relationship for M365.

• Manage Premier or Unified Support engagements, support cases, and service reviews with Microsoft.

• Stay current on Microsoft roadmap changes and proactively assess impact, risk, and opportunities for the organization.

• Influence Microsoft product direction by providing structured feedback based on enterprise usage and requirements.

Architecture and Engineering Leadership

• Provide architectural guidance and design oversight for M365 solutions and integrations.

• Lead the evaluation, design, and implementation of new M365 capabilities and features.

• Ensure platform designs align with enterprise security, compliance, identity, and data governance standards.

• Partner with Security, Compliance, Networking, Endpoint, and Cloud teams to deliver cohesive platform solutions.

Automation and Continuous Improvement

• Drive automation and infrastructure-as-code practices for M365 administration where applicable.

• Identify opportunities to improve platform reliability, scalability, cost optimization, and user experience.

• Establish metrics and dashboards to measure platform health, adoption, and operational effectiveness.

Advisory and Enablement

• Act as a trusted technical advisor to IT leadership, product owners, and business stakeholders on M365 capabilities and constraints.

• Provide guidance and mentoring to senior and mid-level engineers supporting the platform.

• Contribute to enterprise standards, reference architectures, and technical documentation.

Required Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in enterprise IT engineering or platform engineering roles.

• Deep hands-on expertise with Microsoft 365 services, administration, and troubleshooting in a large enterprise environment.

• Strong knowledge of Entra ID (Azure AD), identity federation, conditional access, and modern authentication.

• Experience managing Microsoft Unified or Premier Support engagements.

• Proven ability to lead through influence and operate effectively as a senior individual contributor.

• Strong problem-solving skills with the ability to operate in high-severity incident scenarios.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Microsoft certifications such as Microsoft 365 Enterprise Administrator Expert or equivalent.

• Exposure to Microsoft Intune, endpoint management, and device compliance concepts in an enterprise environment.

• Familiarity with PowerShell automation and scripting for M365 administration.

• Experience supporting regulated or compliance-driven environments (e.g., SOX, SOC, ISO).

• Prior experience operating in a global, 24x7 enterprise environment.

Level Expectations (P4 – Staff)

• Recognized as a subject matter expert for Microsoft 365 across the organization.

• Influences platform strategy and technical direction beyond immediate team boundaries.

• Owns complex problem spaces and delivers durable, enterprise-scale solutions.

• Operates with minimal oversight and is trusted to make high-impact technical decisions.

On-Call and Availability Expectations

• Provide on-call and after-hours support, as required, for Microsoft 365 and related enterprise tools and platforms, including Sev 1 and Sev 2 incidents occurring during nights, weekends, and holidays.

• Act as a senior escalation resource during on-call periods, supporting incident triage, service restoration, and technical decision-making.

• Lead or contribute to root cause analysis and post-incident reviews for incidents engaged after hours.

• Primary working hours are aligned to U.S. Eastern Time, with flexibility required to meet business continuity and operational needs.

Reporting Structure

This role reports to the Senior Manager, Infrastructure Operations, and works closely with Operations, Security, and Architecture teams.