Product Operations Engineer, Government Applications Special Programs
About The Position
This team focuses on operating and deploying AI capabilities (models, APIs, tools, and integrations) for U.S. federal agencies. You'll work closely with product, research, infrastructure, and legal/governance teams to make AI and future models maximally useful for missions while upholding SpaceX's standards, transparency, and ethical standards. Product Operations Engineers are responsible for the health, performance, and stability of the services that power these missions. You own the full end-to-end cycle of service reliability—from responding to outages to improving codebases and building lasting solutions. You will tackle critical issues for key government customers, introduce observability into complex systems, address technical debt in essential codebases, and inform strategic investments in core products. We are looking for engineers who enjoy deep-dive troubleshooting, feel strong ownership over the problems they encounter, and recognize the urgency of customer-facing outages. During periodic on-call shifts, you will respond to automated alerts, investigate issues reported by customers, and share technical expertise with adjacent product teams.
Requirements
- Bachelor's degree in computer science, engineering or another STEM discipline; OR 2+ years of professional experience in software development in lieu of a degree
- Must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed
- 20% travel may be required to government sites
- This position requires successfully obtaining and maintaining a Top Secret Security Clearance as a condition of employment.
- Applicant must be a (i) U.S. citizen or national, (ii) U.S. lawful, permanent resident (aka green card holder), (iii) Refugee under 8 U.S.C. § 1157, or (iv) Asylee under 8 U.S.C. § 1158, or be eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.
Nice To Haves
- 1+ years of hands-on software engineering experience building scalable systems, APIs, or AI/ML applications (strong Python proficiency, other languages a plus)
- Experience working with large language models, generative AI, or agentic systems—either in research, production, or applied engineering
- 1+ years of experience working on enterprise applications that serve >10,000 users distributed across geographies and time zones
- Familiarity with government or public sector technology environments (federal civilian agencies, state/local gov, or regulated industries like healthcare, finance, or infrastructure)
- Strong product sensibility: ability to translate ambiguous stakeholder needs into concrete technical solutions
- Demonstrated ability to write clean, maintainable, high-performance code under tight timelines
- Exceptional problem-solving skills and intellectual curiosity—you thrive on hard, ambiguous challenges.
- Excellent communication skills; you can explain complex technical concepts to non-technical partners clearly and concisely.
- Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure), containerization (Docker/Kubernetes), API orchestration.
Responsibilities
- Own the health, performance, and stability of integrations between frontier AI models (e.g., Grok family) and government systems, platforms, and data environments
- Continuously invest in documentation, metrics, monitors, and other troubleshooting tools that keep these services observable and operable
- Tackle critical issues for key government customers: respond to automated alerts, investigate reported problems, and drive lasting fixes
- Partner with agency stakeholders and adjacent product teams to understand operational needs, share technical expertise, and iterate based on real-world feedback.
- Partner with agency stakeholders to understand requirements, prototype solutions, and iterate rapidly based on real-world feedback
- Address technical debt in essential codebases and inform strategic investments in core products
- Participate in on-call rotations during business hours and occasional weekends, maintaining resilient, high-uptime production systems
Benefits
- comprehensive medical, vision, and dental coverage
- access to a 401(k) retirement plan
- short and long-term disability insurance
- life insurance
- paid parental leave
- various other discounts and perks
- 3 weeks of paid vacation
- 10 or more paid holidays per year
- paid sick leave
- long-term incentives, in the form of company stock or long-term cash awards
- potential discretionary bonuses
- ability to purchase additional stock at a discount through an Employee Stock Purchase Plan
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Entry Level
Education Level
Associate degree
