Principal Full Stack Engineer

Bixal is a consulting company headquartered in Fairfax, VA, working alongside governments and organizations to help them deliver better services and experiences to the communities they serve. Using evidence-based knowledge and technology, Bixal empowers clients to deliver on their missions more effectively by fostering a culture of learning and continuous improvement.

Our values:

• People-First
  :
  Emphasizing the importance of people in all aspects of work.

• Collaboration and Transparency
  :
  Valuing teamwork and open communication.

• Growth Mindset
  :
  Encouraging innovation and continuous improvement.

• Creating Lasting Impact
  :
  Focusing on meaningful outcomes and positive change.

About the role:

Bixal is seeking a Principal Full Stack Engineer to lead technical delivery on a federal platform that supports government wide regulatory planning and review. Federal agencies, oversight offices, and the public rely on these systems, which must stay available 24/7/365 while a modern replacement is built alongside them.

This role spans both sides of that work. You will keep the existing Java, Spring, and Oracle applications stable, performant, and secure, leading defect resolution and delivering approved enhancements. You will also design and build the replacement platform on cloud, container, and Dev Ops foundations, shaping its target architecture, its integrations with related federal systems, and the path for moving users and data off the legacy stack.

Priorities shift between the two, so we're looking for a hands-on technical leader who is equally comfortable sustaining a production system and building a new one.

You will set technical direction, mentor engineers, and partner with our Project Manager, designers, and security lead. You will also work directly with the client's technical leads and product owner, translating complex trade-offs into clear recommendations.

This is a full-time position on an awarded contract with a 12-month base period and two 12-month option periods. This role offers you a unique opportunity to make a meaningful impact on a project that aligns with Bixal's mission of delivering innovative, human-centered solutions. While the role has a fixed duration, we are committed to transparency and collaboration, keeping you informed about contract updates and new opportunities.

At Bixal, we support your professional journey, ensuring your experience reflects our inclusive, purpose-driven culture and prepares you for future success.

This role can work remotely from anywhere in the USA. You must be legally authorized to work in the US. Bixal does not provide visa sponsorship.

The salary range for this role is $145,000 - $155,000. In the spirit of transparency, most offers tend to land near the midpoint of the range. We make compensation decisions thoughtfully, considering your experience, the skills you bring, and our commitment to internal equity. Fairness and transparency are core to how we operate.

Responsibilities:

• Serve as technical lead for the program, setting engineering standards, reviewing code and architecture, and guiding technical decisions across existing and new systems.

• Lead the Target Solution Architecture and Analysis of Alternatives for the replacement platform, weighing integration, containerized deployment, Dev Ops efficiency, case and workflow management, and security.

• Design, prototype, build, and deploy applications on cloud, container, and Dev Ops foundations, while maintaining and tuning existing Java, Spring, Tomcat, and Oracle applications on Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

• Design reusable platform capabilities such as user access, workflow routing, document management, audit history, reporting, notifications, and public-facing APIs.

• Lead triage, analysis, and resolution of priority defects affecting functionality, availability, security, or data integrity.

• Design and deliver approved enhancements driven by new laws, executive orders, policy changes, and agency needs.

• Build integrations with related federal systems, such as eRulemaking, FDMS, Regulations.gov, the Federal Register, and Login.gov.

• Plan and support data migration, cutover, and decommissioning of legacy capabilities.

• Support 99.5% uptime through patches, upgrades, performance monitoring, alerting, and rapid response to production issues.

• Identify, prioritize, and pay down technical debt, including outdated code and unsupported libraries.

• Own CI/CD pipelines that build with a single command, deploy automatically from version…