Troyanovsky was born in to the family of a hereditary nobleman and brigadier commander in the Imperial Russian Army.

He resigned as a lieutenant in 1906, and in 1907 by the decision of the Kiev military district court he was deprived of all the rights of a retired officer.

In 1908 he was arrested for revolutionary activity, and on 24 February 1909 was sentenced by the Kiev District Court to administrative deportation to the Yenisei province.

At the only meeting of the Constituent Assembly on 5 January 1918, he spoke on the issue of concluding peace, while transparently hinting that the Bolsheviks were selling Russian interests in the war for "German gold".

After the outbreak of the Russian Civil War, from 1918 to 1921 he served in the Red Army and was a teacher at the School of Senior Instructors.

"[5] From 1921 he was in the apparatus of the People's Commissariat of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection of the RSFSR, and in 1923 he officially joined the Russian Communist Party (b).

Welcoming Troyanovsky, Roosevelt expressed his satisfaction at the appointment to the post of Soviet ambassador to Washington "a man known for his friendly attitude towards the USA".

Troyanovsky played an important role in the conclusion of the 1935 Soviet–American trade agreement, which was renewed annually in subsequent years.