Sr. Staff Systems Engineer (Fedramp)

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks®, we’re united by a shared mission—to protect our digital way of life. We thrive at the intersection of innovation and impact, solving real-world problems with cutting-edge technology and bold thinking. Here, everyone has a voice, and every idea counts. If you’re ready to do the most meaningful work of your career alongside people who are just as passionate as you are, you’re in the right place.

Who We Are

In order to be the cybersecurity partner of choice, we must trailblaze the path and shape the future of our industry. This is something our employees work at each day and is defined by our values: Disruption, Collaboration, Execution, Integrity, and Inclusion. We weave AI into the fabric of everything we do and use it to augment the impact every individual can have. If you are passionate about solving real-world problems and ideating beside the best and the brightest, we invite you to join us!

We believe collaboration thrives in person. That’s why most of our teams work from the office full time, with flexibility when it’s needed. This model supports real-time problem-solving, stronger relationships, and the kind of precision that drives great outcomes.

Job Summary

As a Sr. Staff Systems Engineer (FedRAMP) , you will be a senior technical leader in our Engineering & Infrastructure organization and the operational backbone of our automated cloud platforms across strictly governed public sector boundaries. You will have technical ownership over our automated infrastructure, deployment pipelines, and container platforms—challenged to design, harden, and scale systems across our FedRAMP environments. This role provides a unique opportunity to work cross-functionally with Information Security, R&D, and FedRAMP Production Operations teams, placing you at the critical intersection of advanced DevOps systems engineering, cloud automation, and defense-grade compliance strategy.

Key Responsibilities

- Infrastructure as Code & Enclave Automation: Architect, deploy, and maintain modular Infrastructure as Code (IaC) using Terraform and Ansible across Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and GCP Assured Workloads, enforcing consistent baseline configurations across all FedRAMP boundaries.
- Secure CI/CD Pipeline Architecture: Build, manage, and harden automated CI/CD pipelines to support zero-trust software delivery, integrating static analysis, automated container image scanning, vulnerability gates, and automated artifact provenance signing.
- Container Orchestration & Workload Hardening: Manage, optimize, and scale production Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) clusters, enforcing strict network isolation, zero-trust pod security standards (PSS/PSA), mutual TLS, and role-based access controls within defense enclaves.
- Security & Compliance Control Automation: Act as a critical technical bridge to Information Security and FedRAMP compliance teams by automating technical controls for NIST SP 800-53 and DoD CC SRG IL5, generating programmatic Continuous Monitoring (ConMon) evidence, and driving rapid POA&M remediation.
- Production Telemetry & Observability: Design and maintain unified monitoring, centralized audit logging, and proactive alerting frameworks across all boundary enclaves utilizing Google Cloud Operations Suite (Cloud Logging, Cloud Monitoring) and BigQuery to maintain audit readiness and operational health.
- Privileged Boundary Access & Identity Governance: Implement and uphold zero-trust identity architectures within FedRAMP boundaries, leveraging GCP Cloud IAM, Identity-Aware Proxy (IAP), VPC Service Controls, and hardware-backed multi-factor authentication (CAC/PIV tokens).
- Change Governance & Release Resilience: Apply formal change management procedures to deployment workflows, execute blue/green and canary deployment patterns to minimize operational risk, and lead technical incident response to rapidly diagnose and resolve production service disruptions.
- Internal Enabling & Operational Mentorship: Provide self-service automation tooling and compliant enclave access for internal support and development teams, mentoring junior engineers in cloud security, GitOps practices, and systems automation.
- On-Call Operations & Incident Response: Participate in an on-call rotation to support critical FedRAMP cloud infrastructure, responding to high-priority operational incidents, system alerts, and security escalations to maintain SLA availability across regulated environments.

Qualifications

- 8+ years of experience in DevOps, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), or Systems Engineering supporting complex, highly regulated cloud environments.
- Google Cloud Platform Expertise: Deep hands-on experience provisioning, securing, and maintaining infrastructure on GCP, with practical working knowledge of GCP Assured Workloads, Cloud IAM, and VPC Service Controls.
- Containerization & Orchestration: Proven expertise in architecting and operating Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) or Kubernetes clusters in mission-critical production environments.
- Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Advanced proficiency in writing and maintaining modular, testable infrastructure automation using Terraform and configuration management tools (e.g., Ansible).
- CI/CD Pipeline Engineering: Strong background configuring, securing, and scaling enterprise CI/CD pipelines with integrated security testing.
- Regulated Boundary Mastery: Demonstrated experience implementing and enforcing security controls aligned to FedRAMP Moderate/High (NIST SP 800-53) and/or DoD Cloud Computing SRG (IL4/IL5).
- Scripting & Systems Automation: Fluency in Python and Bash for operational scripting, systems integration, and tool development.
- ITSM & Change Control: Solid experience working within formal IT Change Management frameworks and utilizing enterprise ticketing systems.
- Clearance & Eligibility: U.S. Citizenship with the ability to pass background checks and security investigations required for DoD IL5 and federal boundary access.

Preferred Qualifications

- Industry Certifications: Google Cloud Certified Professional Cloud DevOps Engineer, Google Cloud Certified Professional Cloud Security Engineer, or Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA).
- Data & Analytics Platforms: Familiarity with BigQuery for telemetry log aggregation, querying, and audit reporting.
- Zero-Trust Network Architecture: Practical experience with service mesh technologies (e.g., Anthos Service Mesh)
- Systems Languages: Experience with systems programming languages such as Golang and Rust.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/com-missioned roles) is expected to be the annual range listed below. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here .

$153,700.00 - $248,600.00/yr

Our Commitment

We’re trailblazers that dream big, take risks, and challenge cybersecurity’s status quo. It’s simple: we can’t accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at   [email protected] .

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Is role eligible for Immigration Sponsorship? No. Please note that we will not sponsor applicants for work visas for this position.