Software Architect (Drupal & Kafka)

Salary: $92,000 - 132,000 per year Requirements: 10+ years of software engineering experience, including at least 5 years as a lead architect for enterprise web platforms. At least 5 years of hands-on Drupal experience, covering architecture, module strategy, theming, performance, and security. Proven Apache Kafka architecture experience, including event modeling, schema governance, producer and consumer patterns, and operational considerations. Deep AWS architecture expertise with EKS/Kubernetes, Aurora, S3, EFS, Secrets Manager, ECR, CloudFront/WAF, and IAM. Experience owning DevSecOps practices, including GitLab CI/CD, containerization, infrastructure as code such as Terraform, security scanning, and release management. Experience integrating enterprise BPM or case management platforms such as Appian, and identity providers using OIDC/SAML, Login.gov, or comparable technologies. Relational database architecture experience and ability to evaluate DB2 and cloud-native alternatives during migration. Demonstrated accountability for platform-level Section 508 and WCAG 2.1 AA compliance. Agile/SAFe architectural leadership experience. Substantial hands-on experience with AI-assisted engineering tools and sound judgment about their use in federal platforms. Experience with PACE or comparable enterprise container platforms, and with Drupal/MySQL workloads on Kubernetes or OpenShift. Experience designing automated CI/CD quality gates, including Cypress or comparable UI automation, API and performance tests, and security scanning. Strong knowledge of federal security, privacy, records, Section 508, and release/configuration management requirements. Bachelors degree in Computer Science or Engineering and 10+ years of relevant experience; a masters degree is preferred. Preferred certifications include AWS Solutions Architect Professional, Certified Kubernetes Administrator, Acquia/Drupal, or SAFe Architect. Preferred experience designing multi-tenant or reusable platform frameworks for agency programs. Preferred experience integrating AI services through MCP or APIs under enterprise security controls. Responsibilities: Serve as the principal technical authority for a public-facing portal platform and define its end-to-end target architecture across containerized Drupal on Kubernetes, Kafka-based event integration, API-first services, cloud data and secrets management, and automated DevSecOps. Own and document the application, integration, data, infrastructure, and security architecture, including architecture decision records. Design Kafka-based event integration, including topics, schemas, producer and consumer libraries, idempotency, replay, and error handling. Establish REST API standards for versioning, authentication, logging, monitoring, retries, and error handling. Architect the Kubernetes (EKS) runtime and its supporting services, including Aurora, EFS, S3, a centralized registry, CDN/WAF, and managed secrets with pod identity. Set centralized configuration practices that avoid hardcoded environment settings, feature flags, and credentials. Define and lead the DevSecOps pipeline, including containerized builds, GitFlow releases, automated functional and performance tests, image vulnerability scanning, and controlled promotion to staging and production. Design enterprise observability through centralized logs, distributed tracing, API and stream metrics, and performance and business transaction dashboards. Create reusable modules, configurable forms, and component libraries for future initiatives. Define approaches for AI-enabled capabilities such as OCR, document classification, summarization, and assisted case preparation with human oversight, as well as agentic developer tools. Lead technical governance through design reviews, architecture compliance, technical debt planning, and mentorship of leads and senior developers. Ensure the architecture meets federal security requirements and Section 508 obligations, including STIG remediation, boundary definition, PPS documentation, encryption, and role-based access control. Architect Drupal 10+ with MySQL on the DOL PACE platform, ensuring portability, maintainability, and alignment with DOL Enterprise Architecture and approved platform decisions. Define automated testing across unit, API, Cypress/UI regression, Section 508, security, and performance testing, and incorporate tests as CI/CD quality gates. Define architecture patterns for immutable audit logging, records retention, encryption, identity and access control, file scanning, fault tolerance, uptime, scalability, and browser/mobile support as required by the PWS. Lead ATO and security authorization support, including authorization boundaries, PPS, external interfaces, sensitive-data protections, baseline inventories, vulnerability remediation, and architecture evidence. Technologies: AI API AWS Architect CI/CD Cloud Cypress DevSecOps Drupal GitLab IAM Support Kafka Kubernetes MCP Mobile MySQL OpenShift REST SAML Security Terraform WAF Web UX UI Design More: We are NuAxis, a federal IT company focused on making people and customer experience central to government technology solutions. Our team brings together technical and creative thinkers, values collaboration, and supports one another in serving federal clients. This is a full-time Software Architect opportunity focused on a public-facing portal and the DOL PACE platform. We offer information about our benefits and culture, and employment is contingent on successful completion of a background investigation. We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. last updated 42 week of 2026