Software Developer and Platform Architect SME  - Secret

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At Parsons, you can imagine a career where you thrive, work with exceptional people, and be yourself. Guided by our leadership vision of valuing people, embracing agility, and fostering growth, we cultivate an innovative culture that empowers you to achieve your full potential. Unleash your talent and redefine what’s possible.

Job Description:

Parsons is seeking a cleared, highly experienced Software Developer and Platform Architect SME to lead the design, development, integration, deployment, and operationalization of cloud-native systems, Kubernetes platforms, distributed applications, data pipelines, and secure CI/CD capabilities supporting DCDC mission requirements.

The successful candidate will provide technical leadership across development, test, integration, and production environments; establish engineering standards and reference architectures; resolve complex technical challenges; and provide independent technical recommendations to customers and program leadership.

This position requires on-site support at the DCDC facility at Ft. Meade, MD.

What You'll Be Doing:

• Serve as a technical subject-matter expert for systems software, Kubernetes, distributed systems, data streaming, and cloud-native architectures.

• Design and implement containerized microservices, platform services, APIs, and data-processing applications.

• Architect, deploy, and operate highly available Kubernetes platforms on hyper-converged, private-cloud, hybrid-cloud, or comparable infrastructure.

• Develop reusable Helm charts, Kubernetes configurations, custom resource definitions, automation, and Infrastructure as Code for development, test, and production environments.

• Design and improve CI/CD and GitOps workflows supporting automated testing, security scanning, artifact management, deployment, promotion, and rollback.

• Establish software-development, deployment, observability, configuration-management, and operational standards.

• Implement platform capabilities for networking, storage, secrets management, monitoring, logging, alerting, scaling, upgrades, backup, and recovery.

• Apply DevSecOps and software-supply-chain practices, including Zero Trust, container hardening, vulnerability management, SBOM generation, artifact provenance, and secure software delivery.

• Troubleshoot complex software, platform, infrastructure, networking, storage, deployment, and integration issues.

• Lead root-cause analysis and recommend improvements to system performance, scalability, reliability, maintainability, and security.

• Lead architecture reviews, design reviews, technical interchange meetings, customer demonstrations, and operational-readiness activities.

• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to developers, engineers, analysts, and project managers.

• Review technical designs, code, automation, infrastructure configurations, deployment plans, and operational documentation.

• Document architectural decisions, technical standards, implementation strategies, risks, and operational procedures.

• Provide technical input to project planning, risk management, platform implementation, release planning, and operational transition activities.

• Serve as a senior technical point of contact for assigned platform, software, or mission capabilities.

Minimum Qualifications:

• B.S. in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Technology, Computer Engineering, Systems Engineering, or a related technical field.

• 10+ years of progressive experience in software development, platform engineering, systems engineering, cloud engineering, distributed systems, data architecture, or systems integration.

• Demonstrated experience serving as a technical lead, architect, principal engineer, or subject-matter expert on complex software or platform initiatives.

• Extensive experience with containers, microservices, Kubernetes, Helm, custom resource definitions, operators, networking, storage, secrets, and workload lifecycle management.

• Experience designing or operating highly available, scalable, resilient, and secure distributed systems.

• Experience with hyper-converged infrastructure, virtualization, private cloud, hybrid cloud, or comparable environments.

• Experience developing production software, automation, or platform services using Java, Python, Go, Bash, or comparable languages.

• Experience with CI/CD, GitOps, DevSecOps, Infrastructure as Code, declarative configuration, and version-controlled infrastructure.

• Experience integrating automated testing, security scanning, vulnerability management, artifact management, and SBOM generation into software-delivery processes.

• Experience with monitoring, logging, alerting, dashboards, and operational metrics for distributed applications and infrastructure.

• Demonstrated experience troubleshooting complex systems and conducting root-cause analysis.

• Experience establishing technical standards, reviewing engineering products, mentoring technical personnel, and coordinating cross-functional teams.

• Strong analytical, problem-solving, communication, presentation, and collaboration skills.

• Ability to communicate technical concepts, architecture decisions, risks, and recommendations to technical and nontechnical stakeholders.

• Ability to work independently and provide sound technical judgment in a customer-focused environment.

• Active Secret clearance is required.

Desired Qualifications:

• Master’s degree in a related technical field.

• Experience with Rancher, RKE2, vSphere, Harvester, Nutanix, Proxmox, or comparable platforms.

• Experience with AWS GovCloud, DoD Impact Level 5 or Impact Level 6, or other regulated cloud environments.

• Knowledge of DoD CIO Kubernetes reference architectures, STIGs, Platform One, Iron Bank, container hardening, or secure Kubernetes operations.

• Experience operating platforms in restricted, disconnected, air-gapped, or limited-connectivity environments.

• Experience with SRE and platform-as-a-product practices, including service-level objectives, reliability metrics, capacity planning, and operational readiness.

• Familiarity with Agile, Scrum, Kanban, or SAFe methodologies.

• Experience with Zero Trust, least privilege, secrets management, workload security, SBOMs, artifact signing, dependency governance, and software-supply-chain security.

• Experience with Argo CD, Flux, Kustomize, Operators, policy-as-code, or comparable GitOps and Kubernetes governance tools.

• Experience with Kafka or comparable data-streaming and event-processing platforms.

• Experience applying NIST, RMF, FedRAMP, DoD cybersecurity controls, STIGs, or Authority to Operate processes.

• Experience leading technical teams across development, test, integration, production, and sustainment environments.

• Experience developing reference architectures, technical roadmaps, modernization plans, and transition strategies.

• Relevant certifications such as AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, Certified Kubernetes Administrator, HashiCorp Terraform Associate, Security+, or comparable credentials.

Security Clearance Requirement:

An active Secret security clearance is required for this position.

This position is part of our Federal Solutions team.

The Federal Solutions segment delivers resources to our US government customers that ensure the success of missions around the globe. Our intelligent employees drive the state of the art as they provide services and solutions in the areas of defense, security, intelligence, infrastructure, and environmental. We promote a culture of excellence and close-knit teams that take pride in delivering, protecting, and sustaining our nation's most critical assets, from Earth to cyberspace. Throughout the company, our people are anticipating what’s next to deliver the solutions our customers need now.

Salary Range: $148,300.00 - $266,900.00

We value our employees and want our employees to take care of their overall wellbeing, which is why we offer best-in-class benefits such as medical, dental, vision, paid time off, 401(k), life insurance, flexible work schedules, and holidays to fit your busy lifestyle!

Parsons is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, veteran status or any other protected status.

We truly invest and care about our employee’s wellbeing and provide endless growth opportunities as the sky is the limit, so aim for the stars! Imagine next and join the Parsons quest—APPLY TODAY!

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