Engineering Specialist

Summary

Convention of States is seeking an Engineering Specialist to join its Technology Department. The role owns technical tasks and projects end-to-end, develops tools and grassroots-facing features, supports technology acquisition and configuration decisions, and provides IT administration and user support as capacity allows.

Responsibilities

• Take on and own new technical tasks and projects end-to-end — from investigation, defining options and alternative solutions, to execution — consulting with the CTO at key decision points
• Pick up and own development work originating from other departments, in coordination with the Technology Product Manager
• Develop new tooling and grassroots-facing features, leveraging existing and emerging internal back-end systems
• Assist the CTO with researching and defining options for technology acquisitions, right-sizing, and stack reconfigurations
• Work directly with external software developers and with internal development projects involving staff and volunteers
• Provide adjacent support to the Technology department — IT administration and user support foremost among them — and assist the Technical Services Manager, as capacity allows
• Other related tasks, as assigned

Skills

• Take on and own new technical tasks and projects end-to-end — from investigation, defining options and alternative solutions, to execution — consulting with the CTO at key decision points
• Pick up and own development work originating from other departments, in coordination with the Technology Product Manager
• Develop new tooling and grassroots-facing features, leveraging existing and emerging internal back-end systems
• Assist the CTO with researching and defining options for technology acquisitions, right-sizing, and stack reconfigurations
• Work directly with external software developers and with internal development projects involving staff and volunteers
• Provide adjacent support to the Technology department — IT administration and user support foremost among them — and assist the Technical Services Manager, as capacity allows
• Demonstrated history of taking on unfamiliar technology, learning it, and using it effectively
• Significant experience with software development environments and methodologies
• Demonstrated skill developing well-structured code and debugging existing code
• Experience with AI-assisted software development; our department treats AI-assisted work as a baseline tool, lowering the barrier to picking up unfamiliar technologies quickly
• Strong communication and team skills
• Flexibility to set aside primary work for emerging department priorities when needed
• Desirable: experience with web, mobile app, and progressive web app development
• Familiarity with any of the following is a plus but not required: Ruby on Rails, WordPress, GitLab, Salesforce, Google Workspace, Google Cloud, and VCenter

Qualifications

Must Haves

• Take on and own new technical tasks and projects end-to-end — from investigation, defining options and alternative solutions, to execution — consulting with the CTO at key decision points
• Pick up and own development work originating from other departments, in coordination with the Technology Product Manager
• Develop new tooling and grassroots-facing features, leveraging existing and emerging internal back-end systems
• Assist the CTO with researching and defining options for technology acquisitions, right-sizing, and stack reconfigurations
• Work directly with external software developers and with internal development projects involving staff and volunteers
• Provide adjacent support to the Technology department — IT administration and user support foremost among them — and assist the Technical Services Manager, as capacity allows
• Demonstrated history of taking on unfamiliar technology, learning it, and using it effectively
• Significant experience with software development environments and methodologies
• Demonstrated skill developing well-structured code and debugging existing code
• Experience with AI-assisted software development; our department treats AI-assisted work as a baseline tool, lowering the barrier to picking up unfamiliar technologies quickly
• Strong communication and team skills
• Flexibility to set aside primary work for emerging department priorities when needed

Nice to Haves

• Desirable: experience with web, mobile app, and progressive web app development
• Familiarity with any of the following is a plus but not required: Ruby on Rails, WordPress, GitLab, Salesforce, Google Workspace, Google Cloud, and VCenter

Benefits

• Full-time role