Job Description
Staff Software Engineer - Full Stack/SRE This is a remote position. Ad Hoc is a technology company that empowers organizations to deliver scalable, impactful digital services. Using modern, agile methods, our team creates products that meet people’s needs and transform their experience of government. Work on things that matter Our collaborations have shaped some of the defining moments in public-sector service delivery. We’ve helped build products that connect Veterans to tailored services, help millions access affordable health care, and support important programs like Head Start. As we work with agencies to deliver critical services, we’re also changing how the government approaches technology. Built for a remote life Our culture, communications, and tools are built for remote work, enabling us to bring together top talent nationwide. At Ad Hoc, remote life empowers our teams to design work environments that fit their lives and that foster flexibility and collaboration to achieve positive outcomes for our customers. Committed to high expectations and a welcoming culture Ad Hoc values acceptance, accountability, and humility. We aren’t heroes. We learn from our mistakes and improve the process for the next time. We build small, inclusive teams to collaborate closely with our partners to solve the right problems and deliver software that works. The Veterans Affairs business unit helps transform the VA into a modern digital services organization where Veteran outcomes are at the center of every effort. We partner with the VA to design and deliver seamless user experiences for Veterans, their families and caregivers, and VA employees. By applying better practices in service design, product management, and technology, we enable the VA to increase the use, quality, and reliability of services and decrease the time Veterans spend waiting for outcomes. Primary Responsibilities Staff Software Engineer - Full Stack serves as an emerging subject matter expert, while serving as an individual contributor that exhibits a high level of trust, autonomy and empowerment. With minimal oversight from leadership, you will be responsible for leading and monitoring the ability to meet scope, schedule and delivery requirements and may support adjacent programs within the business unit. A Staff Software Engineer - Full Stack exhibits strong influential skills to represent the software engineering practice in planning sessions, advocating for the best technical solution, while communicating tradeoffs. You will serve as the primary lead and proactively communicate with stakeholders; while utilizing strong influential skills to drive improvements in software engineering processes and practices. Primary expectations of a Staff Software Engineer - Full Stack include: Plans and executes on roadmaps for new projects without explicit guidance and direction from technical supervisors Actively participates in conversations and planning sessions with partners and key stakeholders Periodically travels to work with and present to clients, partners, and stakeholders Elaborates on and evolves complex and ambiguous products to uncover constraints and new opportunities Reduces ambiguity in the systems they work with, including adding documentation, refactoring, and automated testing Effectively communicates on existing systems, design decisions, past performance, and a major history of the projects that they’ve been part of for bid-writing, tech demos, and other potentially client-facing communications Participates in technical depth interviews with new candidates Presents on technical topics effectively, articulating implementation complexity and other costs to inform business decisions The Watchtower Team is a specialized SRE team supporting va.gov. We're not your typical SREs. We act as both consultants and hands-on problem solvers, working across multiple teams to improve the reliability, performance, and overall health of the va.gov platform. This is a high-impact role where you'll be directly contributing to the experience of Veterans accessing critical services. We're looking for a highly skilled and adaptable engineer who can diagnose and resolve complex issues in a large web application. You'll be using your expertise in observability, incident response, and software development to improve the stability and performance of the platform. You'll also collaborate with other engineering teams, providing guidance and support to prevent future issues. Key Responsibilities Troubleshoot and Resolve Production Issues: Diagnose and fix performance bottlenecks, errors, and other issues within the va.gov application (primarily a Ruby on Rails mon