Senior Forward Deployed Engineer (CDC)

Skylight

6h•$150,000 - $185,000•Remote

About The Position

At Skylight, software engineers design, implement, and maintain software systems to improve government services for users. This software is built to meet the needs of regular users of government services as well as Skylight’s partners in government. In this role, you’ll work across the stack, moving between frontend, backend, and infrastructure as the work requires. We work with a team at CDC that builds and maintains an integrated disease surveillance system used by state, tribal, local, and territorial (STLT) health departments across the country. It gives jurisdictions case management for a wide range of conditions, and a secure path for moving epidemiologic, laboratory, and clinical data to CDC. Our role is to modernize it — a cloud-based platform designed to improve scalability, security, and adaptability to evolving public health needs. The modernized platform is deliberately built as one shared system rather than a bespoke build per jurisdiction, which is what keeps it maintainable over the long run. But every health department arrives with its own legacy systems, data quirks, and technical maturity, and someone has to own the gap between the platform as built and a given jurisdiction’s reality. That gap is your full-time job: going deep with a jurisdiction, working out what’s actually blocking them, and building the targeted piece that unblocks them without turning into a permanent fork. You may be the main point of contact for a health department, so communication carries as much weight here as technical range. The judgment that matters most is knowing when something needs a quick script and when it needs a conversation with the product team — and asking what this particular jurisdiction actually needs before reaching for a generic fix. If you’d rather be in the weeds with a real customer than removed from one, this is that role. This role is contingent on Skylight being awarded the underlying contract. If we’re not awarded the contract, we’ll let you know promptly and discuss whether there are other opportunities that fit.

Requirements

Comfortable working directly with customers — clear communication matters as much as technical range
Experience with infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, Docker)
Familiarity with CI/CD best practices
Proficient in SQL
Health IT or public health data experience, such as HL7 or disease surveillance systems
Can produce high-quality code by adhering to good practices such as automated testing
Understand the different pieces of software systems and how to fit them together, while keeping performance, reliability, and availability in mind
Understand the importance of always putting users at the center of your work, including thinking through the impact and implications of any code that you write
Experience working on cross-functional teams (product, design, engineering, ops) in iterative delivery
A mindset and work approach that aligns with our core values

Nice To Haves

Full-stack development experience with Java and Python
Experience delivering technology in government, regulated industries, or other public-benefit settings
Possess a foundational understanding of data engineering, including how to use various datastores to handle persistent data in software systems
Familiar with how to build secure, compliant software and defend against common vulnerabilities
Experience delivering technology in government, regulated industries, or other public-benefit settings
A track record of staying aligned and accountable on remote teams

Responsibilities

Partner with state, tribal, local, and territorial (STLT) health departments through onboarding, migration, and troubleshooting, learning their infrastructure and data flows firsthand
Diagnose whether a blocker is a real product gap, a configuration issue, or something that needs a one-off integration, then build that piece yourself
Write the targeted scripts, configurations, and integrations that get a jurisdiction onto the platform without forking the core product
Work closely with the platform, data, and epidemiology teams to stay clear on what’s core-supported versus what’s jurisdiction-specific glue
Surface patterns across jurisdictions back to the product team, so a recurring one-off becomes a real feature instead of getting rebuilt every time
Build secure, compliant software that meets federal security standards and defends against common vulnerabilities

Benefits

Medical insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance
Short-term and long-term disability insurance
Life and AD&D insurance
Dependent care FSA, healthcare FSA, health savings account
Dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 10% of your salary with no vesting period
Flexible paid-time-off policy (generally around 25 days per year), plus 11 paid federal holidays
Up to 12 weeks paid-time-off for all eligible new birth, adoption, or foster parents
Performance rewards, including annual salary increase, annual performance bonus, spot bonuses, and stock options
Business development / sales bonuses
Referral bonuses
Annual $2,000 allowance for professional development
Annual $750 allowance for tech-related purchases
Annual swag budget of $100 to display your Skylight pride with some merchandise (hoodies, hats, and more)
Flexible, remote-friendly work environment
An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good