Lead Infrastructure Software Engineer (Kubernetes)

Location: Arlington, Virginia, United States; hybrid with at least 3–4 days in the office. The role may require up to 10% travel and requires the ability to obtain and maintain an active Secret U.S. Security Clearance.

Salary: $135,000–$273,000 per year.

Company

hirify.global delivers mission-critical software and systems solutions, automation, and digital engineering capabilities for U.S. government defense and weapons programs.

What you will do

• Lead a team of Platform and Deployment Engineers developing, implementing, and maintaining Infrastructure as Code for automated deployment and configuration of Kubernetes-based enterprise products.
• Deploy and maintain multiple Kubernetes clusters in unclassified and classified air-gapped environments.
• Debug deployment and configuration issues, identify root causes, and implement reliable solutions.
• Design and integrate software components across network protocols, messaging frameworks, virtualization platforms, and complex software environments.
• Lead requirements definition, architecture evaluation, code reviews, testing, integration, and delivery of project outputs.
• Mentor engineers and apply AI tools and AI-assisted approaches to improve automation, troubleshooting, and installation workflows.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant technical field or equivalent professional experience; a technical Master’s degree is highly desirable.
• At least 7 years of professional software development or deployment experience in technically rigorous environments.
• Advanced experience with Docker, Kubernetes, Helm or ArgoCD, virtualization technologies, and networking in virtualized environments.
• Proficiency with automation tools such as Ansible, Terraform, Puppet, or Salt, plus strong Linux and Bash/Shell skills.
• Basic full-stack development experience with SQL, Python or Java, JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.
• Ability to obtain and maintain an active Secret U.S. Security Clearance and work onsite in Arlington, VA 3–4 days per week.

Nice to have

• Experience with RKE2, Rook/Ceph, NFS, Kubernetes storage and networking, Git, Jenkins, Artifactory, DevSecOps, AWS, or Microsoft Azure.
• Experience managing personnel while maintaining cost and schedule targets.
• Strong problem-solving skills in ambiguous situations.

Culture & Benefits

• Entrepreneurial work environment focused on innovative defense technology solutions.
• Competitive benefits package, paid time off, and paid holidays.
• 401(k) with immediate vesting and matching.
• Optional 9/80 schedule with the second and fourth Friday off each month.
• Tuition assistance, professional development resources, commuter benefits, and employee events.