Engineer

Job Description

Job Description

This is a U.S. based position. All of the programs we support require U.S. citizenship to be eligible for employment. All work must be conducted within the continental U.S.

Who we are:

Raft ( is a customer-obsessed non-traditional defense tech company dedicated to empowering U.S. military and government agencies with cutting-edge AI/ML and data solutions. We are a leader in autonomous data fusion and Agentic AI, with a purposeful focus on Distributed Data Systems, Platforms at Scale, and Complex Application Development. With headquarters in McLean, VA, our range of clients includes innovative federal and public agencies leveraging design thinking, cutting-edge tech stack, and cloud-native ecosystem. We build digital solutions that impact the lives of millions of Americans.

About the Role:

We are seeking an Platform Engineer with an active Top Secret/SCI clearance to play a pivotal role in automating and orchestrating our critical infrastructure. This position is ideal for a technical expert passionate about deploying, managing, and optimizing system infrastructures using the latest technologies in system automation, container orchestration, and open-source applications. You'll be based in San Diego, CA and work on projects vital to national security and technological advancement.

Key Responsibilities:

• Develop and maintain Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) and automation solutions utilizing Ansible, GitOps principles, and declarative configuration management.
• Design, implement, and maintain automated Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines supporting enterprise platform deployments.
• Develop automation to deploy, configure, validate, and maintain Kubernetes-based applications and supporting platform services.
• Support application onboarding through development, integration, testing, staging, and production environments utilizing automated deployment pipelines.
• Develop and maintain GitOps workflows supporting application lifecycle management and platform deployments.
• Establish and improve governance processes supporting application promotion across engineering environments.
• Identify inefficiencies within existing DevSecOps workflows and develop automation to improve deployment reliability, consistency, and operational efficiency.
• Collaborate with application vendors and software development teams to integrate new applications into the enterprise platform.
• Develop automation supporting Configuration Management activities and improve visibility into configuration compliance across multiple environments.
• Develop and maintain automation supporting operating system configuration, platform provisioning, application deployment, and infrastructure validation.
• Implement systems engineering principles throughout the software development lifecycle to improve platform quality and reliability.
• Collaborate with Platform Engineering, Cybersecurity, Software Development, and Operations teams to ensure secure, repeatable, and automated platform deployments.
• Troubleshoot deployment failures and develop automated solutions to improve platform resiliency.
• Prepare technical documentation, implementation guides, architecture documentation, and operational procedures supporting developed automation.

Required Qualifications:

• Active Top Secret (TS) security clearance.
• Must be eligible to obtain and maintain Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) access.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or a related technical discipline and ten (10) years of relevant professional experience; or Master's degree in a related technical discipline and five (5) years of relevant professional experience; or fifteen (15) years of relevant professional experience in lieu of a degree.
• Minimum five (5) years of experience developing automation utilizing Ansible.
• Experience developing Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) and configuration management solutions.
• Experience supporting Kubernetes-based environments and containerized applications.
• Experience with GitOps methodologies and Git-based development workflows.
• Experience designing and maintaining CI/CD pipelines utilizing GitLab CI/CD or similar technologies.
• Experience with Helm, Kubernetes, and container orchestration technologies.
• Strong understanding of systems engineering principles and software development lifecycle methodologies.
• Experience supporting Linux enterprise environments.
• Strong analytical, troubleshooting, and problem-solving skills.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

Preferred Skills:

• Experience supporting classified or disconnected environments.
• Experience with GitLab CI/CD.
• Experience with ArgoCD or similar GitOps platforms.
• Experience with Harbor or other OCI container registries.
• Experience developing automation utilizing Puppet and Terraform.
• Experience supporting enterprise Platform Engineering teams.
• Experience with RKE2 or other enterprise Kubernetes distributions.
• Familiarity with RMF, DISA STIGs, JSIG, DevSecOps Reference Design, and secure software supply chain practices.
• Experience implementing Agile software development methodologies.
• DoD 8570 IAT Level II certification (or ability to obtain within required timeframe if permitted by contract).

Clearance Requirements:

• Active Top Secret with ability to obtain and maintain SCI

Work Type:

• Onsite in San Diego, Ca
• Relocation provided
• May require up to 10% travel

Salary Range: $100,000 - $185000

• The determination of compensation is predicated upon a candidate's comprehensive experience, demonstrated skill, and proven abilities

What we will offer you:

• Highly competitive salary
• Fully covered healthcare, dental, and vision coverage
• 401(k) with company match
• Take as you need PTO + 14 paid holidays
• Generous Referral Bonuses
• And More!

Our Vision Statement:

We bridge the gap between humans and data through radical transparency and our obsession with the mission.

Our Customer Obsession:

We will approach every deliverable like it's a product. We will adopt a customer-obsessed mentality. As we grow, and our footprint becomes larger, teams and employees will treat each other not only as teammates but customers. We must live the customer-obsessed mindset, always. This will help us scale and it will translate to the interactions that our Rafters have with their clients and other product teams that they integrate with. Our culture will enable our success and set us apart from other companies.

How do we get there?

Public-sector modernization is critical for us to live in a better world. We, at Raft, want to innovate and solve complex problems. And, if we are successful, our generation and the ones that follow us will live in a delightful, efficient, and accessible world where out-of-box thinking, and collaboration is a norm.

Raft's core philosophy is Ubuntu: I Am, Because We are . We support our "nadi" by elevating the other Rafters. We work as a hyper collaborative team where each team member brings a unique perspective, adding value that did not exist before. People make Raft special. We celebrate each other and our cognitive and cultural diversity. We are devoted to our practice of innovation and collaboration.

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We're an equal opportunity employer. All applicants will be considered for employment without attention to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran or disability status.