Lead DevOps Engineer - Texas Remote

Position Description & Qualifications

Serco is excited to support the Air Force Modeling and Simulation Support Services (AFMS3) contract. The primary purpose of this contract is to ensure that the Department of the Air Force (DAF), Department of Defense (DoD), and External Partner Agencies maintain cutting-edge Modeling and Simulation (M&S) capabilities that are secure, interoperable, and efficient.

The contractor will provide comprehensive support and innovative solutions that enable the continuous evolution and enhancement of M&S systems, ensuring that the DAF and DoD can effectively prepare for and execute their missions with the highest level of readiness and lethality.

Must have an active Department of War (DoW) Secret security clearance.

We are seeking an experienced Lead DevOps Engineer to drive infrastructure automation, containerized deployments, and CI/CD maturity across our engineering organization, while serving as a technical mentor and force multiplier for the broader team.

This role owns the design and evolution of our Infrastructure-as-Code (Terraform), container orchestration (AWS ECS), and Docker-based build/deploy pipelines, and is expected to actively grow the skills of other engineers through pairing, code review, and structured mentorship - not just ship infrastructure solo. The ideal candidate is as strong a coach and communicator as they are a hands-on engineer.

In This Role, You Will

Mentorship & Team Leadership

• Serve as the technical mentor for DevOps and platform engineers, actively growing their skills in Terraform, containerization, and CI/CD practices through pairing, code review, and structured 1:1 guidance.
• Establish and lead internal knowledge-sharing practices (brown bags, runbooks, documentation standards, onboarding guides) to raise the team's overall DevOps maturity.
• Set technical standards and best practices for infrastructure code, container builds, and pipeline design, and hold the team accountable to them through review and coaching rather than top-down mandate.

Infrastructure as Code (Terraform)

• Design, build, and maintain modular, reusable Terraform code for provisioning and managing cloud infrastructure across environments (dev, staging, production).
• Establish Terraform state management, workspace, and module versioning strategy to support multiple teams and environments safely.

Container Orchestration (AWS ECS & Docker)

• Architect and operate containerized workloads on AWS ECS (Fargate and/or EC2 launch types), including service definitions, task scaling, networking, and load balancing.
• Own Docker image build standards, including multi-stage builds, image hardening/security scanning, and registry management (ECR).
• Optimize ECS cluster performance, cost, and reliability, including auto-scaling policies, capacity planning, and blue/green or rolling deployment strategies.

CI/CD Pipeline Engineering

• Design, build, and continuously improve CI/CD pipelines that automate build, test, security scanning, and deployment of containerized applications to ECS.
• Implement deployment safety mechanisms: automated testing gates, canary/blue-green deployments, rollback automation, and release approvals.

General Engineering & Compliance

• Collaborate with security and compliance teams to ensure infrastructure and pipelines meet applicable security baselines and, where required, support Assessment & Authorization (A&A)/RMF documentation for infrastructure components.
• Participate in on-call rotation and incident response for infrastructure and deployment-related issues; drive blameless postmortems and follow-through on action items.

To Be Successful In This Role, You Will Have

• An active DoW Secret clearance required at time of hire.
• The possibility to telecommute (Full-time)
• A Bachelor’s degree (or additional years of relevant experience in technical, engineering, cybersecurity, or program management fields in lieu of degree)
• Prior experience supporting AFMS, or other DoD M&S programs is strongly desired
• 8 years of DevOps/infrastructure/platform engineering experience, including prior experience mentoring or leading other engineers.
• A deep, hands-on production experience with Terraform for infrastructure-as-code across multi-environment AWS deployments.
• Hands-on production experience with AWS ECS (Fargate and/or EC2), including service/task design, scaling, and networking.
• A strong hands-on experience with Docker, including image build optimization, security hardening, and registry management.
• The proven experience designing and operating CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins, CodePipeline, or similar) for containerized applications.
• To demonstrate ability to mentor engineers effectively - through code review, pairing, documentation, and coaching - with examples of having grown others' skills.
• A strong working knowledge of AWS core services (VPC, IAM, ALB/NLB, CloudWatch, ECR, Route 53).
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, comfortable presenting technical decisions to both engineers and leadership.
• A CompTIA Security +.
• The ability to travel 10%.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with policy-as-code tools (Sentinel, OPA/Conftest) and Terraform automation platforms (Terraform Cloud/Enterprise).
• Experience with container security scanning tools (Trivy, Snyk, Aqua) integrated into CI/CD.
• Familiarity with observability stacks (Prometheus/Grafana, Datadog, CloudWatch) for infrastructure and pipeline monitoring.
• Relevant certifications (AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, AWS Solutions Architect, HashiCorp Terraform Associate).
• Experience formally leading a team or acting as a technical lead across multiple projects/repos.

If you are interested in supporting and working with our team across the globe on a passionate, talented, and diverse Serco team- then submit your application now for immediate consideration. It only takes a few minutes and could change your career!

Company Overview

Serco Inc. (Serco) is the Americas division of Serco Group, plc. In North America, Serco’s 9,000+ employees strive to make an impact every day across 100+ sites in the areas of Defense, Citizen Services, and Transportation. We help our clients deliver vital services more efficiently while increasing the satisfaction of their end customers.

Serco serves every branch of the U.S. military, numerous U.S. Federal civilian agencies, the Intelligence Community, the Canadian government, state, provincial and local governments, and commercial clients. While your place may look a little different depending on your role, we know you will find yours here. Wherever you work and whatever you do, we invite you to discover your place in our world.

Serco is a place you can count on and where you can make an impact because every contribution matters.

To review Serco benefits please visit: https://careers.serco-na.com/us/en/what-we-offer. If you require an accommodation with the application process please email: careers@serco-na.com or call the HR Service Desk at 800-628-6458, option 1. Please note, due to EEOC/OFCCP compliance, Serco is unable to accept resumes by email.

Candidates may be asked to present proof of identify during the selection process. If requested, this will require presentation of a government-issued I.D. (with photo) with name and address that match the information entered on the application. Serco will not take possession of or retain/store the information provided as proof of identity.

For more information on how Serco uses your information, please see our Applicant Privacy Policy and Notice.

Serco does not accept unsolicited resumes through or from search firms or staffing agencies without being a contracted approved vendor. All unsolicited resumes will be considered the property of Serco and will not be obligated to pay a placement or contract fee. If you are interested in becoming an approved vendor at Serco, please email Agencies@serco-na.com.

Serco is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, and other legally protected characteristics.

Pay Transparency

Our Total Rewards package includes competitive pay, performance-based incentives, and benefits that promote well-being and work-life balance—so you can thrive both professionally and personally.

Eligible employees also gain access to a wide range of benefits from comprehensive health coverage and health savings accounts to retirement plans, life and disability insurance, and time-off programs that support work-life balance. Program availability may vary based on factors such as contract type, location, hire date, and applicable collective bargaining agreements.

Salary range

The range for this position can be found at the top of this posting. This range is provided as a general guideline and represents a good faith estimate across all experience levels. Actual base salary will be determined by a variety of factors, including but not limited to, the scope of the role, relevant experience, job-related knowledge, education and training, key skills, and geographic market considerations.

For roles available in multiple states, the range may vary to reflect differences in local labor markets. In addition to base salary, eligible positions may include other forms of compensation such as annual bonuses or long-term incentive opportunities. Benefits – Comprehensible benefits for full-time employees (part-time employees receive a limited package tailored to their role):

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance
• Robust vacation and sick leave benefits, and flexible work arrangements where permitted by role or contract
• 401(k) plan that includes employer matching funds
• Tuition reimbursement program
• Life insurance and disability coverage
• Optional coverages that can be purchased, including pet insurance, home and auto insurance, additional life and accident insurance, critical illness insurance, group legal, ID theft protection
• Birth, adoption, parental leave benefits
• Employee Assistance Plan

To review all Serco benefits please visit: https://careers.serco-na.com/us/en/about-us.

Serco complies with all applicable state and local leave laws, including providing time off under the Colorado Healthy Families and Workplaces Act for eligible Colorado residents, in alignment with our policies and benefit plans. The application window for this position is for no more than 60 days.

We encourage candidates to apply promptly after the posting date, as the position may close earlier if filled or if the application volume exceeds expectations. Please submit applications exclusively through Serco’s external (or internal) career site. If an applicant has any concerns with job posting compliance, please send an email to: careers@serco-na.com.