Staff Data Engineer Software

Front Door Defense; Arlington (VA); On-site; USD 185,000 - 220,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive medical, dental, and vision coverage

Health Savings Account

Employer-paid Life and Disability Insurance

Uncapped paid time off

Flexible work and remote work policy

Job summary

Front Door Defense is seeking a Staff Data Engineer for a remote eligible position to build scalable data ingestion and processing pipelines for operational technology telemetry.

Your responsibilities will include collaborating with multidisciplined teams to design high-impact products that support defense and commercial operations.

Applicants should have 6+ years of software/data engineering experience, expertise with cloud services and containerization, and a strong programming background.

Qualifications

• 6+ years of software/data engineering experience.
• Expertise with batch and streaming data pipelines.
• Experience with cloud services and containerization.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and maintain scalable data processing pipelines.
• Write clean, well-documented, and extensible code.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to drive insights.

Skills

Software engineering experience

Data engineering experience

Programming languages (GoLang, Java, Python)

Big Data (Hadoop, Spark)

Cloud services (Docker, Kubernetes)

Data pipelines (Apache Airflow, Benthos)

Education

MS in Computer Science, Cybersecurity, or equivalent

Tools

PostgreSQL

MySQL

Oracle

Job description

Staff Data Engineer - Remote Eligible

Build scalable data ingestion and processing pipelines for OT telemetry to enable real-time insights.

Location: Remote

Compensation: $185,000 - 220,000 USD / year

Job Tags: Software

About The Role

Staff Data Engineer

Rosslyn, VA or Remote

About Shift5

Shift5 is building the data platform for onboard operational technology (OT). We deliver cybersecurity, predictive maintenance, and compliance capabilities that enable defense and commercial fleets to operate with greater readiness, resilience, and mission assurance.

We are seeking a Staff Data Engineer to join our growing Product Engineering team. In this role, your primary responsibility will be to design, build, and maintain data processing, storage, and integration pipelines while acting as a force‑multiplier for your team. You will report to our Off Vehicle Manager, Software Engineering, and operate in a team‑based environment with engineers, product managers, program managers, and designers to conceive, implement, and shape major features. You'll be a major factor in generating high‑impact products that literally save lives.

What You'll Do

• Design & Build Pipelines: Design, build, and maintain robust, scalable batch and streaming data processing, storage, and integration pipelines using technologies such as Apache Airflow or Benthos.
• Feature Ownership & Leadership: Interpret requirements and design specifications, taking full ownership of building features from the ground up. Mentor and lead the rest of your team to deliver the right solutions.
• Write Quality Code: Write clean, well‑documented, scalable, extensible, and testable code to ensure application quality and maintainability.
• Cross‑Functional Collaboration: Partner with data scientists and engineers to create semantic data models representing complex vehicular systems, and integrate applications cleanly across other Shift5 componentry.
• Support Stakeholders: Build scalable data products for data scientists, transportation engineers, and executives to drive insights and decision‑making.
• Cloud Optimization: Create efficient, reliable, cost‑effective, dynamically scalable, and observable solutions utilizing AWS cloud services.
• Data Analysis & Quality: Analyze complex data sets to create data ontologies, verify data quality/integrity, and ensure data accuracy throughout pipelines.
• Field Support: Support the design process and occasionally travel to customer sites (estimated a few times per year) to collaborate with Field Engineers on data integration and deployment.

What Success Looks Like

• High‑Impact Delivery: You successfully deliver scalable, observable, supportable, and reliable data processing applications that empower customers to run smarter, safer fleets.
• End‑to‑End Ownership: You confidently steer complex data applications from scratch—including requirements gathering, design, planning, and implementation—in a fast‑paced environment.
• Collaborative Impact: You actively shape product design alongside multidisciplinary teams, acting as a technical leader and force‑multiplier for your peers.
• Adaptability: You efficiently multitask and smoothly accommodate changing priorities on demand to meet the dynamic needs of a scaling company.

What We’re Looking For

Required:

• Engineering Experience: 6+ years of software/data engineering experience with a deep understanding of software engineering practices and concepts.
• Core Languages: 6+ years of experience with a major programming language (GoLang, Java, or Python).
• Databases & Big Data: 6+ years of relational database experience (PostgreSQL, MySQL, Oracle, etc.) alongside 6+ years of experience with Big Data (Hadoop, Spark) and Data Modeling.
• Cloud & Containers: 4+ years of experience with containerization and cloud services (Docker, Kubernetes) and cloud monitoring tools.
• Data Pipelines & Stack: Expertise with batch and streaming data pipelines (Apache Airflow, Benthos) and familiarity with modern data stack components (ingestion, transformation, orchestration).

Preferred:

• U.S. citizenship: required and ability to obtain a security clearance.
• Education: MS in Computer Science, Cybersecurity, Cyber Intelligence, or equivalent.
• Data Architecture: Experience and understanding of data lakes/warehouses (e.g., Snowflake, Databricks, Redshift).
• DevOps Practices: Proficiency with CI/CD, source control, design reviews, and integrating observable practices.
• Advanced Languages & Tools: Experience with Rust, SDK design, and implementation (including code gen of type‑specific bindings to Python, Go, TypeScript).
• Travel Flexibility: Willingness to travel occasionally to customer and partner sites to support field integration and deployment efforts.

Compensation & Benefits

• Base Salary: $185,000 - $220,000
• Bonus program and equity in a fast‑growing startup
• Competitive medical, dental, and vision coverage for employees and their families
• Health Savings Account with annual employer contributions
• Employer‑paid Life and Disability Insurance
• Uncapped paid time off policy
• Flexible work & remote work policy
• Tax‑deferred public transit benefits with Metro SmartBenefits (DC/MD/VA)

Shift5 is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age, marital status, ancestry, projected veteran status, or any other protected group or class.