Principal Cloud Engineer

Principal Cloud Engineer About Coalfire

Coalfire is on a mission to make the world a safer place by solving our clients hardest cybersecurity challenges. We work at the cutting edge of technology to advise, assess, automate, and ultimately help companies navigate the ever-changing cybersecurity landscape. We are headquartered in Chicago, Illinois with offices across the U.S. and U.K., and we support clients around the world.

But thats not who we are thats just what we do.

We are thought leaders, consultants, and cybersecurity experts, but above all else, we are a team of passionate problem-solvers who are hungry to learn, grow, and make a difference.

FedRAMPs 2026 modernization replaces narrative compliance documentation with measurable security outcomes, validated through automation and evidenced continuously. Coalfire delivers FedRAMP environments against standardized reference architecture, and this role owns those architectures and the capabilities that deliver them. This is the top of our engineering individual-contributor track: a design-authority role with no direct reports, whose influence comes from technical judgment and expertise.

The standards you set are what dozens of engineers build against, at every client, every day. Youll take on the most strategic and technical implementations our clients require and support the Cloud Services organization on continuous delivery improvements through client engagements. If youre driven by a desire to innovate, excel at operational excellence, and thrive in a collaborative environment, come be part of a team committed to making the world a safer place.

Own the technical integrity of Coalfires FedRAMP reference architectures and capabilities across AWS, Azure, and GCP, and across certification levels.

Set the engineering standards delivery teams build againstarchitecture patterns, security baselines, automation frameworks, and evidence-collection approaches.

Review and approve custom architecture decisions when client requirements fall outside the standard; promote recurring customizations into the reference architecture so the standard improves every quarter.

Serve as a technical escalation point for delivery teams on architecture and security design questions to improve client outcomes.

Keep reference architectures current with evolving FedRAMP requirements, including machine-readable compliance packaging (OSCAL or JSON) and continuous-monitoring mandates.

Mentor engagement architects and senior engineers; raise the technical bar across the delivery organization.

Partner with the sales organization on solution shape for the most strategic pursuits.

Represent Coalfires technical point of view in the FedRAMP community working groups, public comment, and industry forums.

WORK ENVIRONMENT/

TRAVEL REQUIRED:

Travel:
Approximately 1015%

U.S. citizenship is required, as this position supports federal compliance programs.

BS or above in a related Information Technology field or equivalent combination of education and experience

10+ years in cloud security engineering and architecture, including principal- or staff-level scope

Hands-on FedRAMP authorization experience building, operating, or assessing FedRAMP environments

Demonstrated design-authority experience: owning standards, running architecture review, and documenting decisions in a form other engineers build from

Deep expertise in infrastructure-as-code (Terraform or equivalent), CI/CD, policy-as-code, and compliance automation

Architecture depth on at least two of the three major cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP)

Fluency in NIST 800-53 and the FedRAMP control framework, as well as CMMC and DoD compliance standards

Excellent communication, organizational, and…