Think tech salaries are wild? Check out what Microsoft pays its AI team

Microsoft is living in two realities.

On one side, the company has conducted multiple rounds of layoffs this year, axing thousands of workers and quietly pushing out underperformers with performance improvement plans and severance offers. On the other, it’s handing out eye-popping salaries and retention bonuses to employees working on artificial intelligence — especially those advancing Copilot and its broader generative AI strategy.

A confidential internal document obtained by Business Insider showed that Microsoft is encouraging managers to reward employees working on internal AI tools, even offering financial incentives to keep them from jumping ship. That’s not entirely surprising given the company's massive investments in the space, including billions spent on its partnership with OpenAI and the rapid expansion of its Copilot-branded tools.

AI is clearly the future Microsoft wants to bet on — and it’s paying accordingly.

Work visa application data for the first quarter of 2025 reveals that AI-focused staff at Microsoft can earn a base salary of over $300,000, a lot more than their non-AI counterparts.

Salaries in Orbit

Among the highest-paid roles:

• A Staff Software Engineer in Machine Learning at LinkedIn can make up to $336,000 in base salary.
• A Senior Software Engineer in Systems Infrastructure at Microsoft can earn $278,000.
• Product Managers focused on AI and Copilot initiatives can make up to $250,000.

Here’s a snapshot of the salary ceiling for select Microsoft and LinkedIn roles in Q1 of 2025:

• Software Engineering: up to $284,000
• Data Science: up to $274,500
• Hardware Engineering: up to $270,641
• Technical Program Management: up to $238,000
• Cloud Network Engineering: up to $220,716

And the money doesn’t stop at engineering. Business-focused roles are also seeing strong compensation ranges:

• Financial Analysts earn up to $213,800,
• Product Marketers can top out at $213,200,
• UX Researchers can make up to $177,148.

Reshaping the Workforce

While compensation for AI talent soars, Microsoft is retooling its workforce to support that shift — sometimes uncomfortably. Layoffs have impacted traditional sales and support teams, as Microsoft repositions for a world where technical salespeople, cloud architects, and machine learning engineers take center stage. Some of these moves are also aimed at boosting the company’s ability to directly compete with Google and even its own AI partner OpenAI for enterprise customers.

The strategy reflects a broader realignment across Big Tech, where generative AI is not just a hot trend — it’s becoming core infrastructure. Microsoft’s aggressive push into enterprise AI is now coupled with pressure on internal teams to adopt the company’s own tools, especially Copilot, and a growing internal culture that rewards AI-forward thinking.

What It All Means

For now, Microsoft is sending a clear signal: if you’re working in AI, especially on its Copilot tools or within LinkedIn’s machine learning infrastructure, you’re invaluable — and highly compensated. If you’re not, your job may be less secure.

With AI becoming the battleground for talent, prestige, and market dominance, Microsoft is all-in. But in a company of more than 200,000 people, betting big on AI also means deciding who — and what — gets left behind.