Senior Software Engineer (Active Secret Clearance)

Build, Deploy, and Maintain AI for an Unpredictable World

Striveworks helps organizations harness the power of artificial intelligence to solve real-world national security and business challenges by serving as the command center between data, models, and business outcomes. Founded by data scientists and engineers, Striveworks set out to make the journey from deployment to ongoing optimization simple and effective.

With Striveworks, organizations aren’t just deploying AI—they’re building systems that remain reliable, adaptable, and ready to scale in an unpredictable world. Mission-critical operations require models that perform where they’re deployed, scale as workloads grow, and adapt rapidly as AI capabilities advance. Striveworks meets these demands, increasing reliability and performance while lowering costs—and enabling confident, data-driven decision-making in dynamic environments.

The Role

As a Senior Software Engineer at Striveworks, you’ll be challenged—and trusted—on day one to be a core contributor to the products and direction of the company.

Our flagship product, Chariot, is used by customers to develop, deploy, and maintain production machine learning models. We’re looking for exemplary engineers with a product mindset who can write quality code in Go and Python—and who ultimately want to be core contributors to the direction of the company. You’re right for this challenge if you value and possess technical expertise and you push the boundaries of your own capabilities. You are outcome driven, not requirements driven. We’re looking for people who are excited about our central development themes:

Everything as Code

Cloud-neutral development

User-centric design

Hexagonal, event-driven, microservice architecture

Optimizing, deploying, and refining AI models and algorithms

This position follows a hybrid work model, combining remote work with on-site support at customer locations in the Northern Virginia area, with up to 10% travel.

The Right Fit

In addition to the specific skills and expertise detailed below, we are looking for individuals who share our values. Sharing a set of values allows us to move at the speed of trust.

Collectively, we value a high-trust work environment where people respect each other and use candor kindly and constructively. We value work that intersects passion and perseverance, we geek out about the potential of our contributions, and we find joy in working hard on things that matter. Finally, we value taking ownership, having agency, and feeling individual responsibility for collective results.

Here’s what else we’re looking for:

6–8 years of hands-on development experience

Excellence in Go, C++ (17 or higher), Java (11 or higher), C# (9 or higher), or Rust

Proficiency in Python

Experience with DevOps tooling: CI/CD tools, Git, Docker, Kubernetes

Proven experience with cloud architecture: commercial cloud, OpenStack

Experience in the design and development of performant, scalable services

Familiarity with database design and architecture: relational and non-relational

Ability to work cross-functionally and participate in or lead design discussions

Ability to independently lead the software development life cycle, from collaborating with product teams on requirements to executing technical design, implementation, and deployment

Experience in knowledge sharing, mentoring, and coaching (i.e., onboarding, code reviews, leading junior engineers)

Strong understanding of software development principles, such as object-oriented programming, design patterns, documentation, and agile methodologies

Driven, self-directed personality

Strong sense of mission and commitment to making a difference

Bachelor’s degree in computer science or a related field, or similar experience

Active Secret (or above) US security clearance

Due to the nature of this role, candidates must have US citizenship

The Wish List

We’re very interested in developers who possess the above qualifications, and we heavily appreciate and consider the addition of:

Active TS/SCI security clearance

Understanding of synchronous/asynchronous programming and concurrency

Comfort with integration of deep learning libraries (e.g., PyTorch, TensorFlow)

Experience designing RESTful, gRPC, or GraphQL APIs

Understanding of networked and distributed computing

Knowledge of messaging systems (e.g., NATS, Kafka, RabbitMQ)

Experience with workflow automation

The anticipated base pay range for this position is $185,000–$230,000/year. Striveworks’ total compensation package includes a competitive base salary, equity grants, and cash bonuses.

The Benefits

Medical/dental/vision insurance

Voluntary life, long-term disability, accident, and hospital indemnity insurance

HSA and FSA (including dependent care FSA) plans

401(k) plan

Unlimited PTO

Paid parental leave

Check us out on Built In!

Striveworks is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, belief, sex (including pregnancy and gender identity or expression), national origin, social or ethnic origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, genetic information, age, membership in an employee organization, retaliation, parental status, military service, or other non-merit factors. Striveworks will not tolerate discrimination or harassment of any kind.

If you require assistance or a reasonable accommodation in the application process, please contact Operations at .

In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States and to complete an employment eligibility verification form upon hire.

Striveworks is a participating employer in the E-Verify program.