Staff Platform Engineer
Defense Unicorns3 months ago
Remote, United StatesStaff+
Responsibilities
- Architect and maintain scalable runtime production environments across cloud-native and containerized systems, including Kubernetes-friendly applications for bare-metal deployment.
- Own the platform vertical’s technical roadmap, identify gaps, plan initiatives, and align engineering efforts with mission objectives.
- Mentor engineers, raise technical standards, and provide technical leadership across the team.
- Identify technical overlap across projects and guide teams toward efficient delivery.
- Advise Mission Managers on engineering competency, capacity, velocity, and mission alignment.
- Collaborate with product teams and customers on product fit, production usage, and technical roadmaps.
- Advocate for and enforce DevSecOps practices, including security automation, container security, and compliance.
- Evaluate and select methods and products for solving complex business problems.
- Continuously improve CI/CD pipelines, deployment patterns, and operational tooling.
Requirements
- US citizenship and eligibility to obtain a Secret security clearance are required.
- Deep expertise solving highly technical problems spanning multiple knowledge domains is required.
- Deep knowledge in one or two key technologies such as pipelines, GitOps, Kubernetes, or Go is required.
- Demonstrated experience with Kubernetes and container-based systems is required.
- Expertise with YAML is required.
- Proficiency in security automation, API Security, Container Security, and Cloud Security is required.
- Proficiency in architecture security design, monitoring, and performance instrumentation in complex enterprise environments is required.
- Experience with continuous delivery, distributed architectures, everything-as-code, containerization, and cloud services is required.
- Strong independent problem-solving, communication, cross-functional collaboration, and process-improvement abilities are required.
- Experience working with Agile frameworks in a remote environment is required.
- DoD 8570 IAT II certification or ability to obtain it is preferred.
- Department of Defense production ATO experience and familiarity with Big Bang, Iron Bank, or C-ATO processes are preferred.
- Expertise in DevSecOps/DevOps and CI/CD theory and implementation is preferred.
Benefits
- Medical, dental, and vision insurance with premiums 100% company paid
- Health Savings Account, life insurance, and disability insurance
- 401(k) retirement plan, company stock options, and home office budget
- Flexible Time Off, federal holidays, one week for Thanksgiving, and two weeks for Christmas and New Year’s
- Paid parental leave
- Reimbursement for approved trainings and subscriptions
- Conference travel, lodging, and fees
- Requires approximately 25% travel
- Requires an active Secret clearance to apply; US citizenship is required
Tech Stack
Categories
About Defense Unicorns
Defense Unicorns builds platform software and services that streamline secure, cloud-native delivery for defense and federal programs, with emphasis on DevSecOps, Kubernetes, and air‑gapped environments. It provides software and professional services under government contracts to deploy open-architecture platforms and CI/CD pipelines across classified and disconnected systems. Founded in 2021 and headquartered in Colorado Springs, the privately held company serves U.S. defense and national security agencies.