Software Developer, Application Design & Development - R&S - R024789

Primary Location : DC-Washington

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Employee Status : Regular

Overtime Status : Exempt

Job Type : Standard

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Relocation Provided: : Yes

Compensation Grade Low: : FR PAY GRADE 23

Compensation Grade High: : FR PAY GRADE 24

Minimum Salary: : $78,800

Maximum Salary: : $120,000

Posting Date : Oct 17, 2024

Minimum Education

Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience

Minimum Experience

1

Summary

Participates in designing, coding, testing, implementing, and maintaining software solutions. Supports decreasing the occurrence of defects in software functionality by providing thorough descriptions of defects when they do occur, including indicating the root cause and resolutions. Supports the process of designing, constructing, and implementing software systems/applications to meet strategic and/or business needs. With extensive guidance, implements DevOps and Agile best practices in accordance with Board guidance and policies. Participates in recommending security enhancements based on knowledge of IT security trends and best practices.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Participates in designing, developing, coding, testing, and debugging solutions (including staff reviews). Has foundational skills to use one or more programming languages to develop applications and stays up to date on advances in programming languages to produce efficient and dynamic code. 
• Participates in proactively maintaining systems and/or applications in efforts to avoid temporary service loss. When service is lost, provides assistance to restore the systems/applications in a time efficient manner, to cause the least disturbance possible to the operation of the Board.
• Supports the development of testing methods and decreasing the occurrence of defects in software functionality by providing thorough descriptions of defects when they do occur, including indicating the root cause and resolutions.
• Participates in administering, supporting, and developing software solutions. Supports more senior staff in identifying the proper functioning of systems and/or applications and any potential issues that may arise for it.
• Participates in weighing the benefits and drawbacks of multiple system/application designs to determine the best option in terms of cost, time, and Board needs. Supports the process of designing, constructing, and implementing systems/applications to meet strategic and/or operational needs.
• Follows the direction of more senior staff to develop system and/or application access profiles. Has a foundational understanding of how systems and/or applications and data have been used historically to improve technology processes.
• With extensive guidance, implements DevOps and Agile best practices in accordance with Board guidance and policies. Has foundational knowledge of system development processes and philosophies/methods to support phases of system development (i.e., requirements gathering and planning through integration and maintenance).
• Participates in securing the code and data needed to ensure that applications/systems are restricted to the proper audience. Follows secure coding principles, to include security by design, password management, access control, error handling and logging, system configuration, threat modeling, cryptographic practices, and input validation and output encoding.
• Participates in recommending security enhancements to more senior staff based on knowledge of IT security trends and best practices. Through collaboration efforts, supports the implementation of security enhancements necessary for the Board. Has foundational knowledge of stakeholder viewpoints that results in stronger collaboration efforts and management of expectations.
• Shadows more senior staff to learn the steps of a product's lifecycle (i.e., concept, inception, iteration, release, maintenance, and retirement) to ensure a quality product (e.g., applications, division or section websites, content management) and meet the evolving stakeholder and business needs.
• Shadows more senior staff to learn the process of evaluating the Board’s future technology needs, identifying what technology would fulfill such needs, and considering how the new technology would function in the Board environment. Requires foundational knowledge of technology options available in the market and skilled at assessing their viability for meeting Division and/or Board needs. Requires foundational knowledge of key components of cloud computing and one or more cloud technology platforms.
• Participates in designing and developing automated and manual tests to ensure solution quality. Participates in performing testing, integration testing, system testing, and acceptance testing. Maintains functional/system level test cases and generates, maintains, and tracks test results. Diagnoses issues, creates reproducible scenarios/solution, and participates in the development of sustainable test case frameworks conducive for future regression testing. Supports regression testing as applicable and utilizes performance testing tools where needed.
• Participates in ensuring compliance with division governance and Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA).

About the Team & Role
The Application Design and Development (ADD) section in the division of Research and Statistics (R&S) is an enthusiastic team of software developers, user experience designers, and product managers that design, develop, and support solutions that enable the economic research, analysis, and policy work of the Federal Reserve Board.
We are currently seeking a software developer who is creative, has a desire to learn, takes initiative, and has an interest in economics.  The software developer will be responsible for building, maintaining, optimizing, and modernizing custom web applications and software programs that support mission critical business functions.  The ideal candidate will be a full stack developer with a focus on web development and services who enjoys working in a team, interacting with stakeholders at all levels of the organization, and has a drive to improve the user experience of the applications that support our economic colleagues.
Responsibilities

• Work with cross-functional staff to build and maintain usable end-to-end solutions that that deliver value to the organization.
• Write high-quality code that satisfies customer needs and strives for simplicity, clarity, and testability.
• Promote a collaborative team environment and work closely with colleagues to achieve business objectives.
• Collaborate with stakeholders (e.g. business stakeholders, product owners, project managers, and end users) to understand functional and non-functional requirements.
• Support applications by responding to tickets from users and addressing issues in a timely manner.
• Investigate and propose solutions to development and design problems.
• Participate in scope of work estimation and forecasting.
• Adhere to architecture, design, development, implementation, and security standards and best practices.
• Participate in code reviews or use collaborative programming techniques to promote high quality business outcomes.
• Conduct analysis to determine integration needs, and design and plan integrations.
• Implement and conduct functional and performance testing.
• Develop reusable components to enable faster delivery.
• Improve performance of existing software by diagnosing and resolving critical issues.
• Prepare technical documentation, including software design evaluation plans, test results, and technical manuals.
• Review new releases of packaged software and identify new features from which the business would benefit.

Position Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology/Systems, Computer Science, Engineering, or related field with 1-year minimum experience developing software applications and/or platforms.
• Strong proficiency in one or more programming languages (e.g. JavaScript, Python) and frameworks (e.g. React, Ruby on Rails)
• Experience with relational databases (e.g. Postgres).
• Comfortable working in a Linux environment.
• Experience in building APIs and web services for integration of internal products.
• Working knowledge of DevOps and CI/CD principles and practices.
• Strong ability to understand context for code, the codebase, and its relation to business objectives.
• Ability to work both independently and on a team.
• Demonstrated ability to communicate complex technical information in a condensed manner to various stakeholders verbally and in writing.
• Excellent problem solving and analytical skills.
• Growth mindset and a willingness to learn new skills, technologies, and frameworks.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with content management systems (CMS) (eg. Drupal).
• Experience with low-code platform enablement to build a more self-service environment for the business users.
• Experience with the ServiceNow platform, including building custom applications and workflows, desired.
• Experience evaluating, selecting, customizing, and supporting future technology needs, including languages, platforms, and vendor software packages.
• Experience with agile development methodologies.
• Interest in economics, economic measurement, statistics, and data science.

Note: This position requires an on-site presence via a hybrid work schedule in our offices in Washington, D.C.