Principal Systems Engineer, F9

About F9
F9 is a mission-oriented team of Principal Software Engineers that have come together to deliver modern software engineering capabilities to the United States Defense Industry. Our customers include the United States Air Force, Aerospace, Raytheon, and Harris.

F9’s CEO, Eric Schoonover, started his career as a software engineer at Microsoft and Netflix where he progressed from a risky hire with no experience and no education to a principal level software engineer. He co-founded a YCombinator-funded startup after leaving Netflix and eventually landed at Time Inc as Vice President of Engineering. Prior to founding F9, he was Director of Engineering for the United States Digital Service in the Executive Office of the President, and Director of Engineering at the Defense Digital Service in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

All F9 principals have extensive private sector experience and deeply value a culture of effective software engineering, freedom, and responsibility.

Responsibilities
At F9 Principal Systems Engineers are responsible for designing and supporting server, rack, and network hardware infrastructure in data centers supporting American war figthers around the globe. You will provide infrastructure engineering subject matter expertise to help resolve systemic issues, perform effectie capacity planning and expansion, and to ensure mission success.

Required Capabilities
As a Principal Systems Engineer at F9 the expectation is that you are a deeply experienced and highly effective infrastructure and systems engineer aware of the operational needs of the software based workloads being executed and capable of reliably meeting those needs under constrained circumstances. You are a leader, you work well with less experienced systems and infrasturcture engineers, holding them to high standards of performance and mentoring them towards valuable contribution. You have demonstrated hands-on experience managing large fleets of globally distributed hardware running mission critical workloads for thousands or millions of users.

This position requires a SECRET level or TOP SECRET level or TS/SCI level security clearance.

Requirements
  • Expertise in designing, analyzing and troubleshooting hardware that supports large-scale distributed systems
  • At least 8 years experience working as a senior or principal level individual contributor in a software engineering company
  • Proficiency in automated infrastucture provisioning and configuration (e.g. Terraform, Chef, Ansible, CloudFormation)
  • Experience with Unix/Linux operating systems internals and administration (e.g., filesystems, inodes, system calls, etc) or networking (e.g., TCP/IP, routing, network topologies and hardware, SDN, etc.)
  • Systematic problem-solving approach, coupled with effective communication skills and a sense of ownership and drive.
  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, a related technical field involving systems engineering (e.g., Physics or Mathematics) or equivalent practical experience

Working at F9
Generous Compensation
We came for the mission, but we know the market value of the best people. We offer generous compensation packages in-line with industry.

DIY Benefits
We give our employees a generous allowance to use on a healthcare plan of their choice from several flexible tiers and formats. If you don't spend it all, you keep the difference.

Gear for Professionals
We understand that having the right gear makes your life better, and your work better. Premium noise-cancelling headphones, a top-of-the-line computer of your choice, and a baller mechanical keyboard are all standard issue. Something else? No problem. We trust our team to expense what they need.

Unlimited PTO
As a group of senior and principal engineers, most of us have families and—quite frankly—amazing lives outside of work. Get things done, but take as much time as you need, when you need it.

Ownership & Freedom
F9 hires experts in their field and trusts them to make the most of their time. You will own every aspect of your work, because we trust you to be awesome.

Proper Playtime
Whether it's snowmobiling in the mountains or dining at some of the best restaurants in the world, our team outings are not standard corporate events. You will never be forced to participate in mediocre mandatory fun.

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