Staff/Principal Security Engineer (HHS) Save

About Skylight

Skylight is a digital consultancy using design and technology to help government agencies deliver better public services. We’re at the forefront of a civic movement to reinvent how all levels of government serve families, patients, and many others in today's digital world.

If you want to play a part in driving this critical movement forward, we’d love for you to join our growing team of public interest technologists. The work we do matters.

About the job

Security is central to public trust, and in this role your work will strengthen the resilience of systems that millions of people depend on every day.

At Skylight, security engineers work at the forefront of the field, helping teams adopt modern processes, tools, and practices. They collaborate in cross-functional squads to embed security into every stage of software delivery.

In this role, you’ll be part of a major modernization effort at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), building secure, scalable platforms for enterprise use. You’ll partner with product, design, engineering, and data teammates to turn strategy into running systems — strengthening identity and access, hardening cloud foundations, and creating secure defaults that help teams move faster and safer. And your impact won’t stop at launch: you’ll leave behind durable capabilities and practices that reshape how government delivers technology for years to come.

What you’ll do

• Lead threat modeling, security design reviews, and risk analyses that shape enterprise platforms and services
• Implement remediations and automation that strengthen resilience across cloud, infrastructure, and applications
• Define and evolve secure defaults and guardrails — golden paths such as CI/CD templates, policy-as-code, and infrastructure-as-code (IaC) modules that teams adopt by default
• Partner with product, design, and engineering teammates to embed security throughout the delivery lifecycle
• Establish meaningful security metrics and objectives — e.g., time-to-remediate, mean time to detect/respond, and control coverage — and use them to drive decisions
• Advise client leadership on tradeoffs and strategies for scaling security in complex, multi-team environments
• Strengthen incident readiness through tabletop exercises and continuous improvement of runbooks and controls

What we're looking for

Minimum qualifications

• Proven ability to identify, prioritize, and mitigate security risks across applications, infrastructure, and cloud environments
• Experience embedding security throughout product development and delivery
• Experience automating security and compliance practices across applications, infrastructure, and cloud environments
• Ability to write scripts or leverage infrastructure-as-code tools to automate security practices (e.g., Python, Bash, PowerShell, Terraform, or similar)
• Familiarity with common sources of vulnerability information and modern remediation practices
• Understanding of regulatory requirements for security and compliance (e.g., Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program [FedRAMP], Federal Information Security Modernization Act [FISMA], Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act [HIPAA])
• Ability to work successfully in a professional services environment
• Passion for creating better public outcomes through great government services
• A mindset and work approach that align with Skylight’s core values

Nice-to-have qualifications

• Deep knowledge of identity and access management (IAM), zero-trust architectures, or continuous authority to operate (ATO) processes
• Experience leading large-scale cloud modernization efforts (Amazon Web Services [AWS], Microsoft Azure, or other major platforms)
• Track record of mentoring engineers or building security practices within an organization
• Prior experience working in civic tech, government, or other highly regulated sectors
• Experience working effectively in a remote, distributed team
• Ability to spend time on-site at HHS in Washington, DC — either by being based locally or by traveling periodically for in-person collaboration

Don’t meet 100% of the criteria but think you can do the job? We’d love to chat anyway! We’re on a mission to build diverse teams, and studies have shown that women and marginalized folks are less likely to apply to jobs if they don’t check every box.

Other requirements

• All work must be conducted within the U.S., excluding U.S. territories. Some federal contracts require U.S. citizenship to be eligible for employment.
• You must be legally authorized to work in the U.S. now and in the future without sponsorship.
• As a government contractor, you may be required to obtain a public trust or security clearance.
• You may be required to complete a company background check successfully.
• Some of our available roles are on federal contracts that require a degree or additional years of experience as a substitute.

Position type

This is a full-time, exempt position.

Location

This is a remote-friendly role. You can be based anywhere in the U.S. Candidates in the Washington, DC area, or those willing to travel there periodically for in-person collaboration, are especially encouraged to apply.

Care package

Salary

We want to give you the most competitive salary possible. After all, you deserve it! To that end, we use the results of our interview process to determine what salary is most appropriate given your current level of seniority. For a Security Engineer at Skylight, the current salary ranges are as follows:

• Associate Security Engineer: $90,000–$125,000
• Security Engineer I: $120,000–$140,000
• Security Engineer II: $135,000–$160,000
• Senior Security Engineer: $150,000–$185,000
• Staff Security Engineer: $170,000–$203,000
• Principal Security Engineer: $180,000–$230,000

Benefits

Your well-being is important to us, so we focus on supporting you in a variety of ways:

• 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)
• Dollar-for-dollar charity donation matching, up to $500 per year
• Flexible, remote-friendly work environment
• An environment that empowers you to unleash your superpowers for public good

Interview tips

• Visit our join page to learn more about how our interview process works.
• Check out our Career Pathways framework to learn more about the different roles within Skylight and the skills needed to do them.
• If you’d like to request reasonable accommodations during the application or interviewing process, please contact our recruiting team at [email protected].

We participate in E-Verify and upon hire, will provide the federal government with your Form I-9 information to confirm that you’re authorized to work in the U.S.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, sex, religion, age, disability, veteran status, or any other category protected by applicable law.