Staff DevSecOps Engineer

About Niche

Niche is the leader in school search. Our mission is to make researching and enrolling in schools easy, transparent, and free. With in-depth profiles on every school and college in America, 140 million reviews and ratings, and powerful search tools, we help millions of people find the right school for them. We also help thousands of schools recruit more best-fit students, by highlighting what makes them great and making it easier to visit and apply.

Niche is all about finding where you belong, and that mission inspires how we operate every day. We want Niche to be a place where people truly enjoy working and can thrive professionally.

About The Role

We are looking for a Staff DevSecOps Engineer to step in as a subject matter expert and key innovator of security automation and developer experience throughout our software development life cycle (SDLC) and systems architecture. You will be integral in accelerating the capabilities of our development teams by designing development and delivery solutions that are both easy to use and embeds security and compliance as a core automated function. You will partner with teams across Product Development, Data, and Operations to understand their needs and act on high impact opportunities. As a Staff Engineer, you’ll be a key contributor to a holistic security strategy, establish a culture of security through technical leadership, contribute to high level systems design, and balance the needs between operational efficiency and security.

What You Will Do

During the First Month:

• Learn about Niche by meeting with various team members to learn more about our company through our Onboarding meetings
• Immerse yourself and get to know your engineering team members, stakeholders that we interact with on a daily basis, and understand the day to day operating model of development teams and your role
• Gain a foundational understanding of the current development and application platforms and processes by pairing with engineers and completing software engineering onboarding milestones, carrying that experience as insight for how to improve developer experience

Within 3 Months:

• Complete a detailed assessment of the current state of our development and security platform that covers tech stack, systems architecture, security and compliance coverage, and areas of immediate need
• Begin discussions to bring together our security and development platform vision with the key challenges and opportunities identified in your assessment. Work cross functionally to start developing an application security and developer experience roadmaps that can be prioritized based on impact
• Start to influence a culture of application security by delivering best practices and standards documentation and training. Be involved in architecture guilds, acting as a grounding presence for security fundamentals

Within 6 Months:

• Have a complete understanding of the SDLC with a long term vision for innovating security and development tooling going forward
• Offload and shift left in areas of security ownership where you can provide people or teams the ability to self service
• Stay updated with emerging security and developer experience trends and bring those insights into planning where it has the potential to make an impact for Niche

Within 12 Months:

• Your contributions have led to quantifiable improvements in how efficient software development and delivery has become while expanding security coverage throughout the SDLC. Engineering teams agree that they feel more effective with the tooling we’ve provided
• Interfacing with compliance requests and audits has become seamless and routine through automation and continual improvement of our security posture

What We Are Looking For

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related technical field and/or active industry certifications such as CISSP
• 7+ years of proven ability in software development roles focused on security and automation with a minimum of 3 years as a senior+ level engineer
• Expertise in writing, testing, and troubleshooting with high-level programming languages with a preference toward Golang, JavaScript/Typescript, and Python
• Expertise in embedding DevSecOps principles into software development lifecycles with an emphasis on building CI/CD pipelines and enhancing developer experience in a cloud-native distributed systems environment
• Experience with penetration testing tools and techniques as well as security orchestration and observability tooling
• Deep understanding of security principles and best practices, with experience implementing security controls in distributed cloud environments, ensuring compliance with standards regulations such as SOC 2, CPRA, GDPR, etc
• Strong combination of technical, leadership, and communication skills that can drive technical architecture discussions, influence technical decisions cross functionally, and explain complex technical concepts to broad audiences of varying areas of focus to garner consensus buy-in

Are you excited about the position and its responsibilities, but hesitant because your experience doesn't align 100% with the posted requirements? We believe you are more than a resume, so go for it! You won’t want to miss the opportunity to play a part in helping students find where they belong.

Compensation

Our national target base salary range is $132,000-$165,000, plus participation in our Annual Bonus and Stock Option Program. Base compensation will be commensurate with experience and skills.

At Niche, our Total Rewards Philosophy is centered around creating a workplace environment that attracts, motivates, and retains top talent by providing a comprehensive and competitive rewards package. This philosophy is built on the principles of performance-based compensation, best-in-class benefits and work-life balance, and employee well-being.

WhyNiche?

• We are a fully flexible workforce empowering our employees to choose to work remotely, in our Pittsburgh office or whatever combination suits you
• Full time, salaried position with competitive compensation in a fast-growing company
• Best-in-class 100% paid employee health plan, including vision and dental and supplemental coverage
• Flexible Paid Time Off Policy
• Stipend that allows you to build your work from home office in a style and function that suits your personal preferences
• Parental leave for all employees (12 weeks fully paid) in addition to short term disability for birthing parents
• Meaningful 401(k) with employer match
• Your ideas and work will make an immediate impact on our company and millions of users
• You will join a team that cares about you, our mission, our work - and celebrates our wins together!

Niche will only employ those who are legally authorized to work in the United States without sponsorship now or in the future for this opening.

We are currently hiring in states where we currently have employees: AZ, CA, CT, FL, GA, IL, IN, KY, LA, ME, MD, MA, MI, MO, NE, NH, NJ, NY, NC, OH, OK, OR, PA, SC, TN, TX, VA, WA, DC, WV.

Candidates only. No recruiters or agencies, please. Sorry, we do not offer relocation assistance.

Niche is an equal opportunity employer committed to fostering an inclusive, innovative environment with the best employees. Therefore, we provide employment opportunities without regard to age, race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, disability, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or any other protected status in accordance with applicable law.

All interviews are being held remotely. If there are preparations we can make to help ensure you have a comfortable and positive interview experience, please let us know.