AI Architect for Federal Domain w/ Active Secret clearance

The Consortium, Inc.; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 130,000 - 160,000; Full time

Job summary

The Consortium, Inc. is hiring an AI Architect in Washington, DC, to deliver AI solutions to federal clients. You will ensure compliance with federal security standards, oversee installations, and support product integration for government agencies.

This role requires a Bachelor's in Computer Science and 7+ years of relevant experience, including expertise in Kubernetes and federal projects. The position entails up to 50% local client engagement.

Qualifications

• 7+ years in Federal engineering with 3+ years in IL5/IL6 environments.
• Proven track record with ATO lifecycle and RMF processes.
• Advanced proficiency with CI/CD pipelines in Kubernetes.

Responsibilities

• Support installation, configuration, and integration of products.
• Provide consultative architecture assistance for federal clients.
• Manage CVE remediation and security accreditation processes.

Skills

AI and machine learning knowledge

Federal engineering experience

Kubernetes expertise

Infrastructure as Code (IaC)

Linux Systems Hardening

DevSecOps knowledge

System Administration

Strategic Communication

Education

Bachelor’s in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Terraform/OpenTofu

AKS/EKS/OpenShift

GitLab

Helm

Job description

As a member of the Professional Services team, AI Architects help position, sell, and support our platform as the gold standard for AI in enterprises and overcome any barriers to delivering for customers. You will work hand-in-hand with Customer Success, Sales, Product, Engineering, and Marketing to help us bring our platform to clients and prospects in the public sector space.

You will be responsible for providing the technical expertise to support the installation, configuration, upgrading, and integration of our products into customer environments. You will have a broad range of skills and experience spanning systems architecture, ETL flow design, security engineering, cloud computing, Kubernetes orchestration, and more. You will have demonstrated experience deploying and maintaining technical platforms in both unclassified and classified environments, navigating federal security and compliance requirements, and responding to Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) to ensure platform integrity and operational continuity. You will have the insight to make the connection between a customer’s specific business problems and our solution and the customer‑facing skills to communicate that connection and vision to a wide variety of technical and executive audiences. Furthermore you will have the skills to provide consultative assistance on architecture and implementation of the customer’s business problem, usually through partnership with IT teams within federal government agencies.

As the AI Architect for the Federal Sector, you will also serve as a liaison between Product, Engineering, and the Federal business. You will apply your expertise in Federal infosec requirements, the Risk Management Framework, and FedRAMP and Agency authorization processes to inform how the Product evolves to meet Federal requirements and maintain continuous Authority to Operate (ATO).

Requirements

• Shares our passion for delivering AI and machine learning for enterprises and thrives in the dynamic AI environment.
• Lead the professional services effort to plan and execute successful installations, upgrades, and security accreditation in Federal customer base, including managing CVE remediation and timely patch response within classified and sensitive environments.
• Have the flexibility and willingness to jump in and get what needs to be done to make us and our customers successful.
• Provide consultative assistance on architecture and implementation.
• Deploy and operate solutions within FedRAMP Authorized, IL5, and IL6 classified environments, ensuring compliance with applicable security controls, continuous monitoring requirements, and CVE response SLAs.
• Support pre‑sales activities including architectural overviews, security review, and scoping of professional services activities.
• Keep up to date on the ever‑evolving technologies for systems architecture, AI/ML, and LLM/MLOps to be an authoritative resource for both internal and customers.
• Work collaboratively with a broad range of people inside and outside the company.
• May support, oversee, and/or train technical members of partner organizations as it pertains to architecture, administration, and maintenance of the platform.
• This opportunity is contingent on security clearance validation.

Expertise

• Federal Domain Mastery: 7+ years in Federal engineering with 3+ years supporting IL5/IL6+ environments. You must have a proven track record navigating the full ATO lifecycle, managing RMF processes, and handling Continuous Monitoring (ConMon) for FedRAMP and Agency‑specific authorizations.
• Kubernetes and Secure Enclaves: Deep production expertise with AKS, EKS, or OpenShift. You are an expert at architecting and maintaining production‑grade clusters in air‑gapped, egress‑constrained, or "high‑side" disconnected environments (CKA/CKAD preferred).
• Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Advanced proficiency with Terraform/OpenTofu for immutable infrastructure provisioning and Ansible/Puppet for automated configuration management and drift detection.
• Linux Hardening & SecOps: Hands‑on mastery of Linux systems with a focus on STIG/CIS hardening, automated patch management, and rapid CVE/vulnerability triage within secure enclaves.
• System Administration: Operational support for production systems covering for system administration, integrations, monitoring, capacity planning, user provisioning, and coordination of maintenance windows.
• Modern DevSecOps: Demonstrated experience building and maintaining CI/CD pipelines on K8s using tools like GitLab, Helm, Flux, or Argo.
• AI/ML Infrastructure: Understanding of the infrastructure requirements for AI/ML workloads, including GPU partitioning/scheduling, model serving architecture, and data egress challenges in a federal context.
• Strategic Communication: Excellent oral and written skills, with the ability to translate complex technical risks into actionable insights for technical teams and executive stakeholders.
• Education: Bachelor’s in Computer Science, a related technical field, or equivalent high‑level work experience.
• Clearance: Active Secret clearance (required); TS/SCI (highly preferred).
• Logistics: Willingness to be on‑site at local (DC area) client facilities up to 50% during peak project phases, with approximately 20% regional travel.

Bonus points

• Certified Kubernetes Administrator
• AWS Certified Solutions Architect or AWS Certified DevOps Engineer certification.

Citizenship and Clearance Requirements

• Must have an active Secret clearance.