Senior Data Engineer

absc-us; Bethesda (MD); On-site; USD 125,000 - 255,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Generous PTO

11 Federal Holidays

401k with match

Health & Wellness allowance

Education & Training funds

Volunteer time off

Charitable matching

Referral program

LOV Awards

Job summary

ABSC is seeking a Senior Data Engineer to join our NDOC DOMEX Technology Platform team in Bethesda, MD. You will design scalable data pipelines and data platforms for OSINT and document media exploitation tasks, collaborating with data scientists and engineers across infrastructure and security domains.

The role emphasizes Elasticsearch, graph databases, Kubernetes, and cloud-native deployments, with a focus on high-availability, performance, and secure data lifecycle management.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field with 12–15 years of experience, or Master’s with 10–13 years.
• Active Top Secret/SCI clearance with ability to obtain and maintain a Polygraph.
• Elasticsearch/OpenSearch architecture, index design, mappings, analyzers, and query optimization.
• Graph databases such as JanusGraph, Neo4j, TigerGraph, Amazon Neptune, or Memgraph.
• Data modeling for hierarchical and highly connected datasets.
• Large-scale ETL/ELT pipeline development.
• Kubernetes deployment and operations for stateful data services.
• Distributed storage systems and high-volume data ingestion.
• Python or Java for data engineering and automation.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and optimize scalable data management solutions for analytics and AI/ML workloads.
• Build and maintain Elasticsearch and graph data platforms for efficient storage, discovery, and analysis.
• Develop scalable ingestion pipelines and data schemas to maximize query performance.
• Deploy and operate Elasticsearch and graph services in Kubernetes using cloud-native tech.
• Collaborate with data scientists, software engineers, and infra teams to deliver high-value integrations.
• Participate in SAFe Agile processes and contribute to architecture discussions and demos.
• Ensure sound engineering practices and compliance with policies.
• Coordinate with test teams to develop automated integration tests.

Skills

Elasticsearch/OpenSearch

Kubernetes

Python/Java

Data modeling

Graph databases

ETL/ELT pipelines

Active TS/SCI clearance

CI/CD / IaC

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field

Master’s degree in related field

Tools

JanusGraph

Neo4j

TigerGraph

Amazon Neptune

Memgraph

Job description

Absolute Business Solutions Corp (ABSC) is not just another tech company. We’re a community of innovators, engineers, analysts and business professionals working together with our customers to tackle the most complex challenges. For more than 20 years we’ve supported critical Department of Defense (DoD), Intelligence Community (IC), Federal Civilian missions and global, multi-national corporations. We specialize in supporting our clients in the Intelligence, Technology, Defense, AI/ML, and Data Science fields. As we continue to grow at a rapid pace, we need some amazing new professionals to join our team.

ABSC is seeking a mission-driven Senior Data Engineer to join our high-impact team supporting the National Digital Exploitation and Open Source Center (NDOC) DOMEX Technology Platform (DTP). In this role, you will help improve data intelligence pipelines serving both Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) operations and document media exploitation for the Department of War (DoW) and the broader Intelligence Community (IC). You’ll play a critical role in developing a future state AI-managed DOMEX Data Discovery Platform (D3P) and DIA-NDOC’s mission.

While the work is primarily conducted on-site at our client location in Bethesda, MD, we offer a flexible schedule and, occasionally, some tasks may be performed remotely. Percentage of remote work will vary based on client requirements/deliverables.

Security clearance required for this role: An Active TS/SCI with ability/willingness to obtain a CI polygraph is required.

Responsibilities:

As a Senior Data Engineer, you will design, develop, and optimize scalable data management solutions supporting advanced analytics and AI/ML workloads. Working closely with data scientists, software engineers, and infrastructure teams, you will build and maintain Elasticsearch and graph-based data platforms that enable efficient storage, discovery, and analysis of complex hierarchical data.Ability to become a POSTMAN power user to support the discovery of critical intelligence insights.

• Design and optimize Elasticsearch indices to efficiently manage large-scale hierarchical classification structures, ensuring high-performance search, aggregation, and update operations.
• Design, implement, and maintain a graph data store supporting hierarchical graph structures optimized for large, dense batch updates and high-throughput analytics.
• Develop scalable ingestion pipelines that support scalable graph analytics.
• Design data schemas, indexing strategies, and partitioning approaches to maximize query performance, scalability, and storage efficiency.
• Collaborate with infrastructure and platform engineering teams to deploy, operate, and optimize Elasticsearch and graph database services in a Kubernetes environment using cloud-native technologies.
• Partner with Data Scientists and AI/ML engineers to ingest, curate, manage, analyze, and securely expunge datasets throughout the data lifecycle.
• Develop automated data loading, transformation, validation, and quality assurance pipelines supporting production analytics workflows.
• Optimize graph and search infrastructure for high availability, resilience, and performance under large-scale analytical workloads.
• Collaborate with software engineers and system architects to integrate graph and search services into microservice-based applications.
• Participate in SAFe Agile development activities, including sprint planning, design reviews, architecture discussions, and technical demonstrations.
• Foster a culture of innovation, collaboration, and professional development within the team.
• Ensure sound engineering practices, compliance with policies, and delivery of high-quality software.
• Coordinate with test teams to develop and monitor automated system integration tests.
• Engage with cross-functional teams to identify and develop high-value integrations with other systems/applications.
• Provide specific input to the software components of system design to include hardware/software trade-offs, software reuse, use of COTS/GOTS in place of new development, and requirements analysis and synthesis from system level to individual software components.

Requirements:

To be successful in this role you need (required):

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Data Engineering, or related field and 12–15 years of relevant experience, or Master’s with 10–13 years of experience.
• Must possess an Active Top Secret/SCI clearance and ability to obtain and maintain a Polygraph.
• Elasticsearch/OpenSearch architecture, index design, mappings, analyzers, and query optimization.
• Graph databases such as JanusGraph, Neo4j, TigerGraph, Amazon Neptune, or Memgraph.
• Data modeling for hierarchical and highly connected datasets.
• Large-scale ETL/ELT pipeline development.
• Kubernetes deployment and operations for stateful data services.
• Distributed storage systems and high-volume data ingestion.
• Python or Java for data engineering and automation.

Desired Skills:

You will wow us even more if you have some of these:

• Experience supporting AI/ML and data science workflows. Apache Kafka or similar streaming technologies.
• Experience with Linux, containerization, CI/CD pipelines, and Infrastructure-as-Code.
• Graph analytics frameworks and algorithms, including graph traversal, centrality, community detection, similarity analysis, and link prediction.
• Experience with Keycloak, and security best practices (authN/Z, secrets management).
• Experience building and maintaining microservices in Kubernetes.
• Familiar with infrastructure-as-code (CloudFormation, Terraform, Pulumi).

Salary is commensurate with education and years’ experience. Salary range for this requisition is: $125k-$255k annual.

Who we are:
ABSC is a technology and services company that combines the agility of a small business with proven processes refined over more than two decades in business. We specialize in supporting public sector clients in the Intelligence, Defense, Health, and Safety areas. Our team stands ready to deliver the next generation of programs, personnel, and solutions to help advance our federal government customers’ driving innovation, agility, and security across all mission areas.

Some of our benefits include:

• Generous PTO plus 11 Federal Holidays
• Retirement Planning - 401k Fully Vested with Match
• Annual Health and Wellness Allowance - buy an Apple Watch, a treadmill, or hit the gym on us
• Career Development - Annual Funds to spend on Education and Training
• Volunteer Time Off - Annually, all employees can spend 8 hours directly supporting a charity of choice
• Charitable Match - ABSC matches an employee’s donation to a qualifying charity
• Referral Program - We pay for internal and external referrals!
• LOV Awards - Earn bonus awards throughout the year from our Living Our Values awards program

*ABSC is a proud V3, Virginia Values Vets, member which recognizes our commitment to hiring Veterans. If you are a veteran, please be sure to include that in your application.*

Equal Opportunity Employer, including veterans and individuals with disabilities.