Role Description
Defense Unicorns is seeking talented and versatile Platform Engineers to join a team of dedicated unicorns advancing freedom and independence globally. In this role, you will help build and sustain a self-managed production environment — serving as the crucial link between application developers and the platform that supports them — while contributing to the growth of Defense Unicorns' capabilities and open source products.
Our teams work across varied technical baselines depending on engagement, with a focus on the Platform layer. To deliver for our Mission Heroes, we also work across IaC automation, security hardening, and implementation. Depending on your level, you'll either be executing with excellence on that platform or helping shape its long-term direction.
Responsibilities
All Platform Engineers are expected to:
- Operate and maintain Production UDS Cloud Environments (Kubernetes and the UDS baseline of tools we deliver to Mission Heroes/Customers), supporting teams operating within that environment
- Develop and maintain a secure, scalable, and observable environment based on Infrastructure-as-Code, leveraging Terraform/OpenTofu across various Kubernetes distributions (EKS, RKE2, and others)
- Implement and maintain CI/CD pipelines supporting the full software development lifecycle — compiling, scanning, containerizing, testing, linting, deploying, monitoring, and releasing
- Leverage a diverse set of cloud and on-prem IaaS providers (AWS, Azure, GCP, vSphere, Proxmox, LXD) to build robust, scalable systems for cloud, on-prem, and hybrid architectures
- Design and implement observability tooling — particularly stacks built on Prometheus, Loki, and Grafana — to help teams diagnose and resolve production-impacting incidents
- Participate in on-call rotation to address production-impacting incidents (business hours only for now)
- Identify and articulate gaps in existing processes, contributing insights to the product backlog
- Communicate complex technical concepts effectively to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
- Work within an Agile framework in a remote environment
Senior Platform Engineers are additionally expected to:
- Solve highly technical problems spanning 2–3 knowledge domains and contribute expertise across Defense Unicorns' open source projects and product repositories
- Demonstrate expert knowledge in 2–3 key technologies (CI/CD pipelines, Kubernetes, Go, or others) and serve as a technical resource for the broader team
- Bring deep Linux/Unix systems administration skills: automate the process of securing, configuring, deploying, and distributing machines to support services including DHCP, DNS, NTP, PXE, IPSec, and others
- Lead security hardening automation efforts (STIGs, FIPS, CIS Benchmarks) across the platform
- Work with Mission Heroes to define a technical roadmap aligned to mission objectives
- Envision and articulate the long-term vision for our products, contributing to strategic planning that aligns technological advancement with mission goals
The listed responsibilities are not exhaustive; additional responsibilities may be assigned based on the evolving needs of the organization.
Preferred Experience and Qualifications
For all candidates:
- 3+ years of experience operating production cloud-native systems within the Kubernetes ecosystem
- Proficiency in IaC, particularly Terraform or OpenTofu
- Experience with automation in Go, Python, Bash, or similar languages
- Experience with CI/CD methodologies and systems such as GitLab Runners or GitHub Actions
- Experience designing, deploying, and maintaining cloud infrastructure in AWS, Azure, or GCP environments
- Experience building and operating observability platforms, particularly those built on OpenSearch/ELK, Prometheus, Loki, and Grafana
- Understanding of NIST 800-171/800-53 and FedRAMP requirements
- Experience in an on-call capacity for platform reliability; ability to monitor, improve, and restore operations within a DevSecOps team
- Strong problem-solving skills and ability to work both independently and collaboratively
- Active DoD Security Clearance (Secret minimum, Top Secret preferred)
- CompTIA Security+, comparable certification, or ability to obtain within 3 months of hire
Additional qualifications expected at the Senior level:
- Demonstrated ability to solve highly technical problems spanning multiple knowledge domains
- Expert-level knowledge in 2–3 key technologies such as Kubernetes (operations, customization, integrations, troubleshooting, operators, webhooks, security), CI/CD, Go, or others
- Deep familiarity with Linux/Unix operating systems and systems administration at scale
- Proficiency with security hardening automation (STIGs, FIPS, CIS Benchmarks)
- Experience architecting and implementing platforms across an array of IaaS providers
- Experience working with customers or stakeholders to define a technical roadmap aligned to mission objectives
- DoD 8570 IAT II certification (or ability to obtain)
Travel expectations: 10%
Nice to Haves
- Fluency in authentication workflows and constructs such as SAML, OIDC, OAuth, JWTs, and zero-trust identity patterns
- Understanding of policy-as-code engines such as Kyverno, or OPA
- Experience with software supply chain tooling including SBOM, Sigstore, and SLSA
- Experience with or understanding of UDS/Zarf and its applications
- Experience with DoD platform tooling such as PlatformOne (Big Bang, Iron Bank, Party Bus)
- Experience in air-gapped environments
- Experience building, testing, and exercising Backup, Disaster Recovery, and Business Continuity Plans
- Experience on a production Authority to Operate (ATO'd) system, including Big Bang, Iron Bank, and/or C-ATO processes
- A passion for continuous improvement through retrospectives, post-incident reviews, and iterating to better ways of working
Full compensation packages are based on candidate experience. Compensation ranges are established using national benchmarking data and apply across all geographic locations within the United States.
Defense Unicorns delivers mission value by streamlining software delivery so our customers can focus on the most important challenges. We share a vision of freedom and security for the advancement of progress and innovation. Our commitment to this vision, and to our mission-driven customers, means a commitment to speed, user experience and optionality, without compromising security. Our team is composed of innovators, software engineers, and veterans with decades of experience delivering technology programs across the federal market.
What We DoWe create and deliver secure solutions for continuous software integration and delivery. Defense Unicorns consolidates the best practices for security pipelines, testing, and deployment automation in order to meet the high security requirements valued by mission owners. Our solutions are agnostic by design and we believe that growing a robust ecosystem of secure, cloud-native software solutions can help enterprise customers inside and outside the federal market buy and integrate software more easily.
Who We ServeDefense Unicorns’ customers are mission-focused leaders across public and private enterprises. We proudly support defense and civil agencies across the U.S. government and we work closely with the creators of leading-edge software solutions to deliver value to the mission-owner by improving the security and consumability of commercial software products.
What We Work On- Kubernetes
- Cloud Environments (AWS/GCP and Azure)
- Infrastructure-as-code (like Terraform/Pulumi)
- Continuous Delivery and automation tooling
- GitOps
- Containers
- CNCF projects and open source products and packages
- Helm/Kustomize-Value Stream Mapping
- Building and improving security delivery
- Building Kubernetes and cloud native applications
- Medical/Dental/Vision
- Premiums are 100% Company Paid
- Health Savings Account
- Life Insurance
- Disability Insurance
- 401k Retirement Plan
- Company Stock Options
- Home Office Budget
- We offer all full-time Unicorns Flexible Time Off (FTO) plus all Federal Holidays, one week for Thanksgiving, and two weeks for Christmas and New Year’s
- Paid Parental Leave
- Reimbursement for approved trainings/subscriptions
- Conferences (travel, lodging, and fees)
Don’t have all the preferred experience or qualifications? Studies show that underrepresented groups like women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs if they don't meet every requirement listed.
At Defense Unicorns, we're committed to diversity. If you're enthusiastic about the role but don't match every criteria, we encourage you to apply. You could be the perfect fit for this or another role! Defense Unicorns is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, national origin, veteran status, genetic information, union status and/or beliefs, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, or local law.
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