Remote Kafka Engineer - Confluent, Kubernetes & DR

System One; United States; Remote; USD 83,000 - 103,000; Part time

Job summary

System One is seeking a Kafka - Confluence Engineer for a long-term, 100% remote contract. The role requires availability for on-site interview in Vienna, VA or Pensacola, FL or San Diego, CA, with EST-hours work schedule.

Responsibilities include administering Confluent Kafka across environments, ensuring HA/DR, and integrating with Kubernetes/OpenShift and CI/CD pipelines. The position demands 5+ years in messaging platforms and 3+ years with Confluent Kafka, plus security and multi-cluster

Qualifications

• 5+ years supporting enterprise messaging and event-driven platforms.
• 3+ years hands-on administration with Confluent Kafka.
• Experience managing multi-environment Kafka deployments (Development, QA, Performance, DR, and Production).
• Knowledge of Kafka cluster sizing, broker management, partition strategy, replication, retention policies.
• Experience troubleshooting producer, consumer, broker, and cluster-level issues.
• Proficiency with Confluent Control Center, Schema Registry, Connect, ksqlDB, and stream processing technologies.
• Experience implementing high availability, disaster recovery, and multi-cluster replication strategies.
• Hands-on experience with Kafka security including TLS, mTLS, RBAC, ACLs, encryption, and authentication mechanisms.
• Strong knowledge of integrating Kafka with Kubernetes/OpenShift, cloud environments, observability tools, and CI/CD pipelines.
• Understanding of event-driven architecture, data contracts, and enterprise integration patterns.
• Preferred: Confluent certifications.

Responsibilities

• Support enterprise messaging and event-driven platforms, ensuring seamless operation and integration.
• Administer and troubleshoot Confluent Kafka environments across multiple deployment stages, including development, QA, performance, disaster recovery, and production.
• Manage Kafka cluster sizing, broker management, partition strategies, replication, retention policies, and capacity planning to optimize system performance.
• Implement and oversee high availability, disaster recovery, and multi-cluster replication strategies to ensure system resilience.
• Configure and secure Kafka, including TLS, mTLS, RBAC, ACLs, encryption, and authentication mechanisms.
• Integrate Kafka with Kubernetes/OpenShift, cloud platforms, observability tools, and CI/CD pipelines for streamlined operations.
• Troubleshoot producer, consumer, broker, and cluster-level issues; perform root cause analysis and implement corrective actions.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to enhance event-driven architecture, data contracts, and enterprise integration patterns.

Skills

Kafka administration

Confluent Kafka

Kubernetes/OpenShift

Cloud platforms

CI/CD pipelines

Troubleshooting

Security concepts

Tools

Confluent Control Center

Schema Registry

Connect

ksqlDB

Job description

System One is seeking a Kafka - Confluence Engineer for a long-term, 100% remote contract. The role requires availability for on-site interview in Vienna, VA or Pensacola, FL or San Diego, CA, with EST-hours work schedule.

Responsibilities include administering Confluent Kafka across environments, ensuring HA/DR, and integrating with Kubernetes/OpenShift and CI/CD pipelines. The position demands 5+ years in messaging platforms and 3+ years with Confluent Kafka, plus security and multi-cluster