AI Application Engineer

The AI Application Engineer builds the software at the heart of STS AI solutions: the agents, retrieval pipelines, APIs, and user-facing features that turn a federal customer’s requirements into a working application. You work test-first from the project’s requirements trio (use cases, mockups, specifications), using Claude Code and STS’s shared agents and skills to move quickly while keeping quality high. Success looks like a steady stream of small, tested, reviewable pull requests that trace back to Jira cards and ship to real users every week. When a client requires AWS-native tooling instead of STS’s standard toolchain, you are equally productive building on Amazon Bedrock, Lambda, and API Gateway., * Practice test-driven development from the requirements trio, writing unit and integration tests from use cases and specifications before application code and ensuring tests pass before opening a pull request.

• Develop on the OpenCORA module architecture when the project uses it, building business-functionality modules on the core chassis and following its conventions.
• Build on AWS-native generative AI services, including Amazon Bedrock, Bedrock Agents and Knowledge Bases, Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, and S3, when a client requires AWS services in place of STS’s standard toolchain.
• Use Claude Code and the team’s shared agents and skills as the primary development workflow, and contribute improvements to those agents and skills back to the team.
• Maintain a clean audit trail from requirements to Jira cards to GitHub pull requests, and keep commits small, reviewable, and tied to a card.
• Participate in backlog grooming, estimate and break down work, and raise requirement gaps early with the business analyst and tech lead.
• Instrument applications with logging, tracing, and evaluation hooks so that AI behavior can be measured, debugged, and improved in each environment.
• Review teammates’ pull requests, pair with the quality engineer on end-to-end test coverage, and support release activities through DEV, TST, STG, and PRD.
• Apply secure coding practices appropriate to federal workloads, including secrets handling, input validation, and least-privilege access to data and services.

• US Citizenship and the ability to obtain and maintain a Public Trust clearance are required
• Bachelor’s Degree is required
• Minimum of 8 years’ position related experience is required
• AWS Developer or Solutions Architect certification (Associate) preferred for hire; the AWS and Anthropic Claude certifications listed under Required Certifications must be earned within 12 months of hire
• Remote position with occasional travel to client sites and STS events
• Candidates living in the DC Metro region (within driving distance for quarterly in-person team events) are strongly preferred; STS is a HUBZone company, so residence in a HUBZone is favored for remote candidates, * Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent professional experience in addition to the minimum below
• Minimum of 8 years of professional software development experience building production web or cloud applications, including at least 2 years building applications on large language model APIs
• Demonstrated experience delivering with test-driven development and continuous integration on a team, and shipping to AWS
• Experience using AI coding assistants or agentic coding tools in daily work, ideally including authoring reusable prompts, agents, or skills for others
• Strong proficiency in Python and TypeScript, including modern frameworks for APIs and web front ends
• Working knowledge of retrieval-augmented generation design, vector stores, embeddings, prompt engineering, and evaluation of LLM outputs
• Hands-on experience with Amazon Bedrock and core AWS application services (Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, IAM, CloudWatch)
• Fluency with Git and GitHub pull-request workflows, Jira, and CI/CD pipelines
• Ability to read Terraform and understand how application code is deployed across DEV, TST, STG, and PRD
• Pragmatic builder who prefers small, shippable increments over large, perfect ones
• Takes requirements seriously and pushes back constructively when a use case or spec is unclear
• Self-directed and comfortable owning outcomes on a small, senior team where everyone contributes across the lifecycle
• Curious and current on AI tooling; treats AI assistants as part of the team and holds their output to the same standard as human work
• Clear, candid communicator with federal clients and teammates; writes well and documents as a habit
• Bias toward fast delivery and early user feedback over conservative gating; learns from failure quickly

Required Certifications (to be earned within 12 months of hire)

• AWS Certified Developer - Associate or AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate
• Claude Certified Developer - Foundations (CCDV-F)

Preferred Certifications

• AWS Certified AI Practitioner
• AWS Certified Generative AI Developer - Professional
• Claude Certified Architect - Foundations (CCAR-F)
• CompTIA Security+

• Competitive compensation package
• Comprehensive health, dental, and vision insurance plans
• Professional development and training
• Performance-based incentives
• 401(k) retirement savings plan
• Work from home stipend
• Unlimited PTO
• Paid holidays
• Flexible work schedule
• Professional development budget to be used for training and certifications