Distinguished Software Engineering Lead

Senior Advisory Technology and Executive Recruiter

Overview Frontier Technology Inc. (FTI) delivers mission-focused solutions to the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community through advanced engineering, digital transformation, and program execution expertise. We help our customers solve complex challenges and achieve mission success by integrating people, process, and technology. FTI is seeking a Distinguished Software Engineering Lead to serve as both a hands‑on architect and integrator for mission‑critical software and data platforms.

This role is designed for a player‑coach—someone who provides technical vision, architectural oversight, and mentoring, while contributing directly to the design and development of secure, scalable, and modernized solutions. The Distinguished Engineer will act as the connective tissue between software execution teams, product and solution management, and business development, ensuring solutions are scalable, secure, and aligned with long‑term innovation goals.

Responsibilities

• Architecture & Systems Integration
  • Architect and deploy secure, distributed platforms supporting modular, multi‑service software environments.
  • Design and integrate APIs, microservices, and data pipelines that enable interoperability across mission, simulation, and analytical systems.
  • Define and enforce architectural principles, modularity standards, and software best practices across development teams.
  • Engineer solutions that bridge cloud, on‑prem, and classified enclaves, ensuring interoperability and compliance.
• Cloud Engineering & Dev Sec Ops
  • Engineer cloud‑native solutions in AWS Gov Cloud or hybrid IL4–IL6 environments with strict security and accreditation requirements.
  • Implement Infrastructure‑as‑Code (Terraform, Cloud Formation, or CDK) to automate provisioning, configuration, and accreditation workflows.
  • Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines that embed security, compliance, and automated testing from development through deployment.
  • Ensure all platform designs support zero‑trust principles, multi‑enclave deployment, and repeatable accreditation (ATO) processes.
• Data Infrastructure & Orchestration
  • Design or oversee large‑scale data ingestion, transformation, and orchestration environments (Kafka, Airflow, Spark, or Databricks).
  • Shape data architectures that balance throughput, latency, and cost across distributed mission environments.
  • Enable secure and efficient data access and synchronization across analytical, AI‑enabled, and simulation workloads.
• Automation, Operationalization & Sustainment
  • Transition software and platforms from prototype to production, ensuring maintainability, observability, and configuration consistency.
  • Establish automated testing, release governance, and performance monitoring standards for ongoing sustainment.
  • Partner with program and product leadership to align delivery with mission lifecycle requirements.
• Security & Resilience
  • Engineer architectures for redundancy and resilience under degraded or disconnected operational conditions.
  • Design and maintain secure enclave architectures, boundary controls, and cross‑domain integration solutions.
  • Collaborate with cybersecurity and ISSM teams to support ATO and ongoing accreditation automation.
• Innovation & Ecosystem Integration
  • Integrate emerging technologies, open standards, and modern frameworks into operational systems.
  • Collaborate with AI/ML, data, and simulation teams to enable model integration and inference services within production software (familiarity with MLOps concepts preferred).
  • Evaluate new tools and frameworks to improve developer productivity, performance, and automation efficiency.
• Leadership & Mentorship
  • Lead by example as a hands‑on technical authority, guiding design and implementation decisions.
  • Mentor software engineers and architects to raise technical standards, code quality, and architectural maturity.
  • Partner with fellow Distinguished Engineers and organizational leaders to align platform strategy with enterprise innovation goals.
  • Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to both executive and engineering stakeholders.

Education / Qualifications

• Preferring candidates close to Dayton, OH;
  Chesapeake,…