Sr. Principal Platform Engineer

The Platform Engineer designs, develops, deploys, and maintains the foundational infrastructure and platform services that enable mission-critical applications to operate securely, reliably, and at scale. This is a hands-on engineering role focused on platform automation, container orchestration, infrastructure reliability, and continuous delivery in secure environments.

The engineer contributes to platform architecture, implementation, and lifecycle management while improving developer workflows, operational efficiency, and system resilience. Working independently and collaboratively, the Platform Engineer solves complex technical challenges, supports project milestones, and helps establish engineering standards that ensure consistent, repeatable, and secure platform operations.

Responsibilities include:

• Design, develop, document, test, and maintain platform services, infrastructure automation, and supporting software.
• Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines and automated workflows that improve build, test, deployment, and release processes.
• Automate infrastructure provisioning, configuration management, operational tasks, and system maintenance using Go, Python, and related tooling.
• Deploy, operate, troubleshoot, and optimize containerized applications and services running in Kubernetes environments.
• Implement and maintain GitOps workflows to manage infrastructure and application configurations, support version control, and provide auditable, repeatable deployments.
• Apply security best practices across platform infrastructure, networking, operating systems, and software delivery pipelines.
• Monitor platform health, troubleshoot complex system issues, and improve reliability, performance, scalability, and operational resilience.
• Collaborate with software engineers, cybersecurity professionals, data engineers, and mission stakeholders to deliver dependable platform capabilities.
• Explore and integrate emerging technologies, including AI agents and intelligent automation, to improve platform operations and mission effectiveness.
• Contribute to technical documentation, engineering standards, and continuous improvement initiatives while ensuring quality and mission requirements are met.

Requirements:

• Strong knowledge of Bash, Ansible and Python, particularly for infrastructure automation, service development, provisioning, and operational tooling.
• Hands-on experience with containerization technologies and deploying, managing, and debugging workloads in Kubernetes clusters.
• Experience implementing GitOps practices to manage, scale, and audit production infrastructure and containerized workloads.
• Proficiency with Linux operating systems, including system administration, troubleshooting, process management, and performance analysis.
• Working knowledge of networking, security concepts, system internals, and secure infrastructure design.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines, source control, automated testing, and software release management.
• Ability to automate repeatable operational processes and develop reliable, maintainable platform solutions.
• Interest or experience in building, integrating, and deploying AI agents or AI-enabled automation capabilities.
• Ability to troubleshoot technical problems of moderate scope and complexity and deliver effective, well-documented solutions.
• Commitment to engineering excellence, secure-by-design principles, and continuous improvement.

Qualifications:

• BS and 8-10 years relevant experience
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering, Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
• Must be able to obtain and maintain a TS/SCI security clearance (note, only US Citizens are eligible for security clearances)

Skills:

• Ability to work independently, take ownership of technical challenges, and deliver results with minimal supervision.
• Strong collaboration and communication skills, with the ability to work effectively across multidisciplinary engineering teams.
• Analytical problem-solving skills and the ability to diagnose issues across application, infrastructure, and platform layers.
• Strong technical documentation habits and a commitment to maintainable, repeatable engineering practices.
• Ability to balance operational demands, security requirements, and long-term platform improvements.

Personality Traits:

• Challenging: You run toward difficult problems rather than away from them. You seek opportunities to solve complex engineering challenges, explore new technologies, and push beyond your comfort zone to deliver meaningful results.
• Excellence: You take pride in the quality of your work and consistently strive to improve. You reflect on past experiences, learn from setbacks, and look for ways to make systems more reliable, secure, scalable, and efficient.
• Humble: You let your work speak for itself. You recognize the contributions of others, share knowledge openly, accept feedback, and focus on measurable outcomes and mission impact rather than personal recognition.
• Mission Alignment: You understand that the mission is bigger than any one individual. You recognize the importance of providing secure, reliable, and resilient technology to support the national security of the United States. You take pride in knowing that your engineering work contributes to protecting the nation and supporting those who serve.
• Ownership and Initiative: You proactively identify opportunities to automate, improve, and strengthen the platform. You take responsibility for your work, follow problems through to resolution, and continuously look for ways to reduce operational complexity.
• Curiosity and Adaptability: You enjoy learning, experimenting, and staying current with evolving platform technologies. You are open to new ideas and approaches, including AI-driven automation, and can adapt your engineering practices to meet changing mission needs.

Details:

• Work Location: Herndon, VA