Senior/Staff Software Engineer (U.S. Air Force)

About Skylight

Skylight is a digital consultancy using design and technology to help government agencies deliver better public services.

We’re at the forefront of a civic movement to reinvent how all levels of government serve families, patients, and many others in today's digital world.

If you want to play a part in driving this critical movement forward, we’d love for you to join our growing team of public interest technologists.

The work we do matters.

About the job

At Skylight, software engineers design, implement, and maintain software systems to improve government services for users. This software is built to meet the needs of regular users of government services as well as Skylight's partners in government.

In this role, you'll partner with a mission-critical organization within the U.S. Air Force Special Operations community to design, build, deploy, and operate secure, scalable mobile systems that support highly specialized operations. You'll apply modern engineering and DevOps practices to ship mobile applications reliably and frequently, automate the infrastructure they depend on, and integrate with existing defense systems. Working in close collaboration with cross-functional teammates and government partners, you'll help modernize legacy environments while ensuring performance, security, and reliability at scale — from device to cloud.

What you’ll do

• Engineer mobile software products (iOS, Android, and/or cross-platform) as part of a cross-functional team that includes user experience researchers and designers, product managers, engineers, and other functional specialists
• Design, build, and maintain CI/CD pipelines that automate build, test, code signing, and release of mobile applications across multiple environments (e.g., Fastlane, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Bitrise, App Center)
• Provision and operate cloud infrastructure using infrastructure-as-code (e.g., Terraform, Pulumi, CloudFormation), with a preference for AWS GovCloud, Azure Government, or other DoD-authorized environments
• Implement observability across mobile clients and backend services — logging, metrics, tracing, and alerting — so the team can detect, diagnose, and resolve issues quickly
• Apply DevSecOps practices including secrets management, dependency scanning, SAST/DAST, secure software supply chain, and continuous compliance against DoD security baselines
• Achieve technical excellence by advocating for and adhering to lean-agile engineering principles and practices such as API-first design, simple design, continuous integration, version control, trunk-based development, and automated testing
• Select and use the right tools, frameworks, languages, and technologies for the job, with a preference for open-source solutions
• Analyze systems to identify technical debt, instability, unreliability, and other opportunities for improvement, then design, document, and communicate solutions
• Coordinate with government partners to ensure seamless integration with their existing tools, deployment processes, and authorization environments (ATO, cATO)

What we're looking for

Minimum qualifications

• Ability to write clean, working, and reusable code
• Mobile application development experience in a system-of-systems context (e.g., iOS/Android native, Swift, Kotlin, or React Native)
• Hands-on experience designing and operating CI/CD pipelines for mobile applications, including build automation, code signing, provisioning profiles, and app distribution
• Working knowledge of at least one major cloud platform (AWS, Azure, or GCP) and infrastructure-as-code tooling (e.g., Terraform, Pulumi, CloudFormation)
• Experience with containerization and orchestration (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes) and modern deployment patterns
• Familiarity with monitoring and observability tooling (e.g., Datadog, New Relic, CloudWatch, Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry)
• Can produce high-quality code by adhering to good practices such as automated testing
• Familiar with how to build secure, compliant software, defend against common vulnerabilities, and apply DevSecOps principles in regulated environments
• Foundational understanding of data engineering, including how to use various datastores to handle persistent data in software systems
• Understand the different pieces of software systems and how to fit them together, while keeping performance, reliability, and availability in mind
• Understand the importance of always putting users at the center of your work, including thinking through the impact and implications of any code that you write
• Experience delivering products in defense or similarly regulated environments
• Passionate about creating better public outcomes through great government services
• A mindset and work approach that align with Skylight’s core values
• Ability to travel for work from time to time

Nice-to-have qualifications

• Familiarity with software engineering best practices and site reliability engineering (SRE)
• Experience with DoD platforms and accreditation frameworks (e.g., Platform One, Iron Bank, Big Bang, FedRAMP, IL2–IL5, ATO/cATO processes)
• Experience with mobile device management (MDM) and enterprise mobile deployment in restricted environments
• Consulting experience, and mentoring/coaching personnel
• Edge computing and experience with AI/ML is helpful
• Experience with multiple programming languages and/or full-stack development
• Familiarity with secrets management and policy-as-code tooling (e.g., HashiCorp Vault, AWS Secrets Manager, OPA)
• Prior experience working in the civic tech space
• Experience working in a remote-team environment

Don’t meet every qualification but think you can do the job? We’d still love to hear from you. If you’re excited about the role, apply. We consider candidates with a range of backgrounds and experiences.

Other requirements

• All work must be conducted within the U.S., excluding U.S. territories. This role requires U.S. citizenship to be eligible for employment.
• You must be a U.S. Citizen
• As a government contractor, you may be required to obtain a public trust or security clearance, up to Top Secret.
• You may be required to complete a company background check successfully.
• Some of our available roles are on federal contracts that require a degree or additional years of experience as a substitute.

Position type

This is a full-time, exempt position.

Location

This is a fully remote position.

Care package

Salary

We want to give you the most competitive salary possible. After all, you deserve it! To that end, we use the results of our interview process to determine what salary is most appropriate given your current level of seniority. For a Software Engineer at Skylight, the current salary ranges are as follows:

• Associate Software Engineer: $90,000–$125,000
• Software Engineer I: $120,000–$140,000
• Software Engineer II: $135,000–$160,000
• Senior Software Engineer: $150,000–$185,000
• Staff Software Engineer: $170,000–$203,000
• Principal Software Engineer: $180,000–$230,000

Benefits

Your well-being is important to us, so we focus on supporting you in a variety of ways:

• Medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance
• Short-term and long-term disability insurance
• Life and AD&D insurance
• Dependent care FSA, healthcare FSA, health savings account
• Dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 10% of your salary with no vesting period
• Flexible paid-time-off policy (generally around 25 days per year), plus 11 paid federal holidays
• Up to 12 weeks paid-time-off for all eligible new birth, adoption, or foster parents
• Performance rewards, including annual salary increase, annual performance bonus, spot bonuses, and stock options
• Business development / sales bonuses
• Referral bonuses
• Annual $2,000 allowance for professional development
• Annual $750 allowance for tech-related purchases
• Annual swag budget of $100 to display your Skylight pride with some merchandise (hoodies, hats, and more)
• Dollar-for-dollar charity donation matching, up to $500 per year
• Flexible, remote-friendly work environment
• An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good

Interview tips

We want you to have a great interview experience with us! Here are some tips to help you prepare for a successful interview:

• Visit ourhttps://skylight.digital/careers/join/[join page](https://skylight.digital/careers/join/) to learn more about how our interview process works.
• Check out ourCareer Pathways framework to learn more about the different roles within Skylight and the skills needed to do them.
• If you’d like to request reasonable accommodations during the application or interviewing process, please contact our recruiting team at recruiting@skylight.digital.

We participate in E-Verify and upon hire, will provide the federal government with your Form I-9 information to confirm that you’re authorized to work in the U.S.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, sex, religion, age, disability, veteran status, or any other category protected by applicable law.