Principal DevOps Engineer - Colorado Springs, Colorado

EmergencyMD; Colorado Springs (CO); On-site; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Davidson seeks a Principal DevOps Engineer in Colorado Springs/Schriever Space Force Base, CO. The role supports MSV‑TASD program and splits time between Colorado Springs and Schriever AFB, CO, with onsite daily and limited remote/hybrid options.

You will design and maintain CI/CD pipelines using Docker, Podman, Jenkins, GitLab, and SonarQube, ensure security baselines, and collaborate across teams in a defense-focused environment.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in STEM with 5 years of related experience; OR Master's with 3 years; OR PhD with 1 year.

Responsibilities

• Design, implement, and maintain CI/CD pipelines.
• Automate infrastructure deployment and management.
• Manage containerization technologies (Docker/Podman), including rootless/rootful configurations.
• Collaborate with development/test teams to optimize build/integration/deployment processes.
• Integrate automated testing and quality/security tools into CI/CD pipelines.
• Monitor system/pipeline performance and improve reliability.
• Ensure security/compliance baselines across environments.
• Work with credential management tools to support secure automation.

Skills

CI/CD design

Linux administration

Shell scripting

Security/compliance

Credential management

Test automation

Education

Bachelor's degree in STEM

Master's degree in STEM

PhD in STEM

Tools

Docker

Podman

Kubernetes

Jenkins

GitLab Runner

Bamboo

SonarQube

Gherkin

Cucumber

Terraform

Ansible

Job description

Davidson is distinguished in the aerospace and missile defense industry, in part, because of its excellence in hiring exceptional experts, engineers and software developers dedicated to delivering advanced, intelligent technology solutions in defense of our nation.

Davidson is seeking for a Principal DevOps Engineer in Colorado Springs and Schriever Space Force Base, CO. This position supports the Modeling and Simulation Vistas - Threat and Advanced Simulations Development (MSV‑TASD) program and will split time between Colorado Springs, CO. location and Schriever Space Force Base, CO.

This role requires candidates to be onsite daily, with limited remote/hybrid work available.

Key Responsibilities

As a DevOps Engineer, you will work in a collaborative environment to understand system requirements and design, implement, and maintain DevOps solutions using tools such as Jenkins, GitLab Runner, Bamboo, Docker, Podman, SonarQube, Gherkin, Cucumber, and others to enable efficient, secure, and repeatable software development and delivery. You will leverage containerization technologies and secure credential and identity management solutions to support our distributed modeling and simulation environments.

• Design, implement, and maintain CI/CD pipelines to support frequent, reliable software delivery
• Automate infrastructure deployment, scaling, and management using configuration management and scripting tools
• Implement and manage containerization technologies (e.g., Docker, Podman), including rootless vs. rootful configurations where appropriate
• Collaborate closely with development and test teams to improve build, integration, and deployment processes
• Integrate automated testing and quality/security tools (e.g., static analysis, code quality, coverage) into CI/CD pipelines
• Monitor system and pipeline performance and implement improvements to ensure reliability and availability
• Ensure security, compliance, and configuration baselines are implemented and maintained across environments
• Work with identity and credential management tools (e.g., credential managers, service accounts) to support secure automation and access control

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics) discipline from an accredited institution and 5 years of related experience; OR a Master's degree in a STEM discipline and 3 years of related experience; OR a PhD in a STEM discipline and 1 year of related experience
• Ability and willingness to travel up to 10% to support business needs
• Experience with containerization and container runtime technologies (Docker, Podman, or similar)
• Experience with automated testing and software development pipelines/factories (e.g., unit, integration, or acceptance tests in CI/CD)
• Experience deploying applications in containerized environments
• Experience with CI/CD and related tools such as the Atlassian tool suite, Jira, GitHub, GitLab, SonarQube, Checkmarx, Coverity, or Jenkins
• Hands‑on experience with Unix/Linux operating systems

Preferred Qualifications

• Strong experience with Linux administration, shell scripting, and operations in production‑like environments
• Experience implementing and maintaining automated software testing and analysis within CI/CD pipelines
• Familiarity with hypervisors, virtualized medium‑ and high‑trust environments (e.g., experience working with hypervisors on medium trust environments)
• Experience working with credential and identity management solutions (e.g., credential managers, service accounts, Keycloak or similar technologies) to securely manage non‑interactive access
• Exposure to Kubernetes or infrastructure‑as‑code tools (e.g., Terraform, Ansible) is a plus
• Experience developing software in a Model‑Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) environment
• Experience with Behavior‑Driven Development (BDD) and tools such as Gherkin and Cucumber for automated acceptance testing

Clearance

• Must have an Active DoD Secret Security Clearance