DevOps Development Lead; Clearance Required

Dev Ops Development Lead (Clearance Required)

Technology | Washington, DC, United States |

Location:

Fort Meade, MD (On‑Site)

Clearance Required:

Active Top Secret/SCI with Full Scope Polygraph (FSP); CI Polygraph within the last 7 years – must be active prior to start

The Dev Ops Engineer (Development Lead) provides a reliable, highly available platform that orchestrates the microservices of a modernized operational system using cutting‑edge technologies. The contractor leads sprint planning and team tasking, drives infrastructure technical direction, and owns CI/CD pipeline management and cloud infrastructure cost optimization. This is a senior individual‑contributor and team‑lead role requiring strong Agile execution discipline, AWS architecture depth, and the ability to communicate and collaborate across engineering and program stakeholder communities.

• Architect, build, and maintain AWS infrastructure including EC2, Lambda, S3, SNS, SQS, Event Bridge, Athena, and Step Functions using Terraform with auto‑scaling.
• Develop Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and scripting to automate tasks, provision managed services, and build internal tooling using Python, Ansible, and Terraform.
• Apply AWS networking principles including VPCs, NAT gateways, and IP gateways to design secure, segmented environments.
• Evaluate infrastructure costs iteratively; recommend and implement cost‑savings measures to reduce AWS service spend and maintenance burden.
• Install, configure, performance‑tune, and operate Kubernetes environments with focus on EKS, ECS, and/or Fargate.
• Manage containerized workloads using Docker and Docker Compose across the microservices architecture.
• Troubleshoot infrastructure issues and ensure system uptime and availability for mission‑critical operational systems.
• Collaborate with development teams to optimize application performance and reliability in containerized environments.
• Develop and manage Git Lab CI/CD pipelines to automate build, test, and deployment processes.
• Implement and maintain Argo CD for Git Ops‑based continuous delivery workflows.
• Track ticket execution and drive technical direction of infrastructure to align with program and product needs.
• Perform high‑level functional systems analysis, design, integration, documentation, cost analysis, and complex issue resolution.
• Decompose sprint priorities and generate tickets aligned with internal team priorities and program objectives.
• Manage team tasking and sprint workloads; keep the team on task and executing in an orchestrated manner.
• Participate in all Agile ceremonies: sprint planning, stand‑ups, refinement, reviews, and retrospectives.
• Communicate and collaborate with engineers, product owners, and program stakeholders across the program.

Education:

Bachelor's degree from an accredited college in a related discipline, or equivalent combined education and experience (12 or more years of professional experience; or 10 years with a related Master's degree).

• Active TS/SCI clearance with Full Scope Polygraph (FSP) – must be active prior to start.
• CI Polygraph within the last 7 years – must be active prior to start.
• Current DoD 8140 (CWIP) certification – must be active prior to start.
• Extensive experience architecting and managing AWS infrastructure using Terraform and IaC practices.
• Strong background in containerization and orchestration:
  Kubernetes (EKS, ECS, Fargate), Docker, Docker Compose.
• Experience developing and managing Git Lab CI/CD pipelines and Argo CD Git Ops workflows.
• Proficiency in Dev Ops scripting languages:
  Python, Ansible, Terraform.
• Experience performing high‑level systems analysis, design, integration, documentation, and cost analysis.
• Experience managing sprint workloads and driving team technical direction in an Agile environment.
• Strong communication and collaboration skills with engineers, product owners, and program stakeholders.

Nice to Have (2 or more):

• AWS services depth: EC2, Lambda, S3, SNS, SQS, Event Bridge, Athena, Step Functions with auto‑scaling.
• AWS networking: VPCs, NAT gateways, IP gateways, and network segmentation design.
• Git Lab CI/CD pipeline design and deployment automation.
• Application…