Do you have serious research experience at the postgraduate level? Working as a software dev doing what is -- no offense intended -- entry-level NLP will not l

Do you have serious research experience at the postgraduate level? Working as a software dev doing what is -- no offense intended -- entry-level NLP will not land you an interview at MS Research. If you want to have a shot at applying to MS Research, I suggest you publish at least one paper in the domain in which you want to do work there. Also, people rarely have 'careers' at MS Research. Most MS Researchers I know went there for one or two years after getting their PhDs and then did something else.