Defense Digital Service - Cloud Engineer
Remote
DDS – Engineering /
Digital Service Expert /
Remote
Digital Service Expert - Cloud Engineer
Come do impactful work with a brilliant, motivated team.
About the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office
The Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) is a Principal Staff Assistant (PSA) responsible for the acceleration of the adoption of data, analytics, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to generate decision advantage across the Department of Defense (DoD). The Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC), Defense Digital Services (DDS), Chief Data Office (CDO), and forward-leaning programs of record including Advana have officially joined together to form one organization – the CDAO!
This position is being recruited as a GS-14 or GS-15, Cyber Security Engineer in the Excepted service. This position will serve under the Directorate for Digital Services formally known as the Defense Digital Services. The work that you do here will directly contribute to our national security, improve the lives of those who serve, and make an impact that spans the globe. The impact you can make here is truly phenomenal. If that excites you and you have the skills, you should apply! We are solving a diverse set of problems, and we need a diverse team to do it. The Directorate for Digital Services DDS transforms how the DoD designs, builds, buys, and deploys technology to save lives and stay ahead of our adversaries. This organization touches on a wide range of issues — from cybersecurity to climate; COVID response to data-wrangling. These complex challenges are tackled head-on by recruiting exceptional tech talent from industry and government to our talented team for a two-year term (with the option to renew for a second term).
This announcement will close on June 23rd, 2023.
Description
Join DDS and build ground-breaking applications to protect the American people and support members of the military and their families. DDS works with partners from the U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Government, and our allies to tackle some of the world’s toughest challenges. DDS engineers are called upon to fix a failing system, to recommend an iterative path forward through a seemingly difficult problem, or to develop a new capability.
As a Cloud Engineer at DDS, whether you are fixing a mission critical system or fielding a new capability, you can see the real world impact of your work. DDS is hiring a talented Cloud Engineer to perform technical duties associated with cloud computing. This can involve designing architectures, configuring deployment pipelines, implementation of developed software, analysis of existing systems, implementing security best practices, and maintenance.
A Cloud Engineer at DDS will succeed if they are a generalist, can pick up projects with little or no context, and is self motivated. All Cloud Engineers are expected to deliver their work as code following the Infrastructure as Code (IaC) model. It is essentially to have experience with at least one of the major cloud providers:: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, or Google Cloud Platform (GCP). It is essential to have experience with Hashicorp Terraform and at least one of the following languages: Python, Javascript, Golang.
Cloud Engineers are members of the engineering Community of Practice (CoP) at the Defense Digital Service (DDS), which also includes data engineers, security engineers, and systems engineers. Engineers at DDS use modern tools and processes for software development.
Roles and Responsibilities
- Provide expert advice to product teams as they design cloud based applications
- Know how to configure, secure, and improve deployment pipelines for CI/CD using best practices
- Implement security best practices and help with the Vulnerability Disclosure Program (VDP)
- Develop scripts or other software to help in development and deployment of cloud computing systems
- Maintain existing infrastructure and develop new infrastructure for applications as they are onboarded
- Use Hashicorp Terraform to deliver repeatable and secure solutions for Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
- Assist in hybrid cloud deployments and contribute to best practices
- Brief senior leadership and end users at varying levels of familiarity with cloud technologies, about the technology selections, best practices, and benefits
- Along with stakeholders own deploying, automating, maintaining and managing cloud-based environments to ensure the availability, performance, scalability and security of environments.
- Build, release and configuration management of the above environments.
- Design, implement, and execute security standards
- System troubleshooting and problem solving across platform & applications
- Suggesting architecture improvements, recommending process improvements.
- Evaluate new technology options as they become available for use.
- Ensuring critical system security through the use of best in class cloud security solutions and practices.
- Monitor maintenance and outages, assess impact, and develop strategies to minimize impact.
- Create and follow up on support tickets.
- Author scripts, and help maintain existing script repositories
- Communicate clearly in written and verbal form with varying audiences of developers and other stakeholders
Technical Experience
- 5+ years experience in infrastructure in a related field: sysadmin, architect, SRE, DevSecOps, infrastructure engineer.
- Experience with at least one of the major cloud providers: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
- Proven experience with Hashicorp Terraform. Understanding AWS CloudFormation or Azure Resource Manager is helpful but not necessary. DDS practices delivering Infrastructure as Code (IaC).
- Proficiency in one of the following languages: Python, Javascript, Golang. Other languages will be considered.
- Experience with terminal, the command line, and shell scripting (bash, zsh, etc)
- Proven experience with Git as a version control system (VCS). Additionally, applicants must understand how to use Github or Gitlab.
- Experience with deployment of CI/CD pipelines such as CircleCI, TravisCI, or Jenkins.
- Applicants must have an understanding of DevSecOps best practices.
- Experience with responding to system reliability or security incidents in a fast, effective, and professional manner
Key Requirements
- U.S. Citizenship.
- Must be able to obtain and maintain a Top Secret/SCI clearance.
- Candidate is encouraged to provide e-portfolio, project samples, Github, etc. to their submission package
Benefits
- The DOD offers a broad array of benefits programs and family-friendly options for DDS employees.
- Federal Employees Health Benefits Program: https://www.opm.gov/insure/health/index.asp
- Life Insurance: https://www.opm.gov/insure/life/index.asp
- Long-Term Care Insurance: https://www.ltcfeds.com
- Federal Employees Retirement SYSTEM (FERS) (new employees automatically covered): https://www.opm.gov/retire/index.asp If you are transferring from another agency and covered by the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS), you may continue in that system.
- Annual and Sick Leave: https://www.opm.gov/oca/leave/index.asp
- Flexible Spending Accounts for Health Care and Dependent Care: https://www.fsafeds.com/fsafeds/index.asp
- Paid Federal Holidays
- Maxiflex work schedule https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/covid-19/opm-fact-sheet-the-use-of-flexible-work-schedules-in-response-to-coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19/
Pre-qualification Questions
- Are you a US Citizen?
- Do you have experience creating a new application or library?
- What programming languages are you proficient in?
- What’s your default sprint cadence? Why?
