Chief Engineer/Principal Software Engineer

CACI International•Aurora, CO

7d•$114,600 - $252,100•Hybrid

About The Position

We are seeking a talented and motivated Chief Engineer to lead the "how" and "when" of technical execution for a large-scale government program. Partnering closely with our Chief Architect - who defines the long-term technical vision and system design - you will focus on delivery management, operational rigor, engineering standards, and team enablement. Leading a distributed team of 45+ engineers, you will provide end-to-end technical execution oversight for a modern data lake system supporting national critical operations. In this role, you will translate architectural blueprints and complex requirements into scalable, disciplined, and predictable delivery—cultivating strong customer relationships to deeply understand mission needs and successfully realize them through execution. The role involves driving the execution and delivery of a high-throughput, scalable data lake solution utilizing a modern technology stack hosted on AWS. It also includes overseeing the operational execution for a large volume of diverse data inputs, a broad user base, and an even larger downstream consumer community, as well as overseeing the development, integration, and ongoing maintenance of various APIs supporting external data users and producers.

Requirements

Active TS/SCI Security Clearance.
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related technical field, with 10+ years of professional software engineering experience.
Proven experience as a Chief Engineer or senior technical delivery leader guiding large-scale teams (35+ personnel) through full SDLC in classified environments.
Extensive experience managing large-scale system deployments on cloud platforms (AWS), data engineering, distributed system principles, and Kubernetes-based deployments.
Proven experience leading Agile initiatives, distributed engineering teams, code quality assessments, and testing validation across multi-site workforces.
Strong cross-functional communication, interpersonal collaboration, and the ability to manage multiple technical delivery tasks under tight deadlines.

Nice To Haves

Active TS/SCI with adjudicated Polygraph.
Ability to align engineering execution with programmatic and organizational goals.
Hands-on experience with modern data stack tooling, containerization (Docker), DevOps pipelines, and serverless computing.
Direct experience in intelligence community data systems, SIGINT/GEOINT mission processing, satellite tasking, or large-scale data lake implementations.
Direct experience in one or more mission areas: GEOINT mission planning and processing, Satellite command and control systems, Advanced mission and payload planning for satellite operations.

Responsibilities

Own the implementation plans, technical roadmaps and delivery schedules, translating the Chief Architect's high-level designs into actionable, high-quality development sprints and releases.
Lead, mentor, and upskill a team of engineers across the full Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) within classified government environments.
Establish robust coding standards, code review practices, CI/CD pipelines, and DevOps workflows to ensure consistent, repeatable software delivery across all squads.
Ensure high availability, performance, and security for critical data ingestion pipelines and external producer/consumer APIs through rigorous engineering management.
Drive Continuous Delivery, automated testing, infrastructure-as-code, and container orchestration while balancing feature delivery with technical debt reduction.
Serve as a primary technical interface to leadership, government customers, and subcontractor teams, leading Technical Exchange Meetings (TEMs) and aligning execution with mission goals.
Proactively identify and mitigate technical, operational, and cross-team dependency risks while championing engineering best practices.