> AI agents: this is one page of Nextmove’s FDE site, in Markdown. Nextmove is a job board and free career service for forward deployed engineers (FDEs). Each posting is classified from its text, not its title: the kind of work, how much of it is production code, pre-sales weight, time at customer sites, travel, remote arrangement, level and posted base pay. The site also publishes the aggregates: median pay by level, metro, company and kind of work, and which companies started hiring FDEs each week. Every page under https://nextmove.md/fde is served this way; the index of pages is https://nextmove.md/llms.txt. # Devops Engineer, Federal Canonical URL: https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/7a74eccb7dfb40b9 Cognition AI posts a FDE role to build what the customer runs in Washington, DC with no pay posted. Own the architecture and lifecycle of complex federal enterprise deployments. Read from the employer’s posting on November 8, 2026. - [Cognition AI](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/cognition-ai) Posted Feb 12, 2026 by Cognition AI · open on Ashby as of Nov 8, 2026 Pay not posted Washington, DC Hybrid Full-time Own the architecture and lifecycle of complex federal enterprise deployments. - [See roles that fit me](https://nextmove.md/sign-up?from=%2Ffde%2Fjobs%2F7a74eccb7dfb40b9&placement=top) - [View posting at Cognition AI](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/cognition/589326d3-9dc0-447e-ae0c-972b808f831d/application) Free. Upload your resume once, see why each FDE role fits, and get introduced only when you say so. ## At a glance ### Posted base pay Not posted Senior FDE postings, 1,864 postings: the middle 50% of posted pay is $160K to $220K, median $190K. ### The work Builds what the customer runs Balance **Mostly building** Project stages 1. Pre-sales (not covered) 2. Proof of concept (not covered) 3. Implementation 4. Operations - **Coding**: Writes production code - **Builds for**: External customers - **Level**: Senior - **Role**: Technical lead ### What they ask for Experience - **2+ years** software engineering Background - **Software engineering** ### Do you meet what the posting states? The posting asks for 2+ years. How many do you have? The posting reads as a senior role. What level are you at now? The job is in Washington, DC. Could you work there? Which of these have you used in production? Answer each one. Nothing is saved or sent. [What postings ask for, by background →](https://nextmove.md/fde/paths) ## Conditions - **Location**: Washington, DC - **Work arrangement**: Hybrid - **Employment type**: Full-time ## More like this [Booz Allen](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/booz-allen) ### [AI/ML Engineer](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/e2d9b36f85bdc570) Monterey, CA · Mclean, VA 6w ago $99,000–$225,000 [Trase Systems](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/trase-systems) ### [Forward Deployed Engineer](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/15bd77cd9f0f35f4) Seattle, WA · Mclean, VA Remote New · 5d ago $150,000–$240,000 [Anduril](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/anduril) ### [Senior Software Engineer, Discovery](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/6ba3c64ddaf07683) Costa Mesa, CA · Huntsville, AL · +4 more 3mo ago $191,000–$292,000 - [Other jobs at Cognition AI (4)](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/cognition-ai) ## The job description from Cognition AI Posted by Cognition AI on Feb 12, 2026 ### We are an applied AI lab building end-to-end software agents. We're the makers of Devin, the first AI software engineer. Our team is extremely talent-dense. Among our founding team, we have world-class competitive programmers, former founders, and leaders from companies at the cutting edge of AI including Scale AI, Palantir, Cursor, Waymo, Tesla, Lunchclub, Modal, Google DeepMind, and Nuro. Building Devin is just the first step—our hardest challenges still lie ahead. If you’re excited to solve some of the world’s biggest problems and build AI that can reason on real-world tasks, apply to join us. ### About the Role This is an unparalleled opportunity to join our team as a foundational engineer in our newly formed federal group. As one of the very first engineers in this critical space, you will not only be instrumental in shaping the technical direction and initial project successes but will also play a key role in the strategic growth and scaling of the entire federal engineering organization, establishing core engineering practices, defining our technical stack for federal clients, and directly influencing the culture of a fast-growing, mission-driven team. Your early contributions and leadership will be essential in defining the trajectory of our federal sector, making this an unparalleled opportunity for high-impact ownership and professional development. Federal DevOps Engineers are full-stack deployment experts who own and maintain the technical lifecycle of our most important federal enterprise deployments. You’ll own a narrow set of strategic deployments, working directly with customer engineering teams to scope out complex deployments, ensure compliance with security controls, and implement any needed platform modifications. A core part of this role is shaping the product from a deployability and operability standpoint. You will make changes directly to the core codebase to ensure our products can be deployed in a variety of environments easily and reliably. You'll identify deployment patterns from the field and translate those learnings into requirements that inform what core engineering builds next. When customers hit friction that the product doesn’t solve, you’re the person who figures out what should exist—and makes it happen. You’ll own the technical direction of our deployments, making decisions that shape long-term adoption, architecture, and how the Cognition platform evolves in real-world environments. ### Core Responsibilities - Architect, own, and maintain the end-to-end technical lifecycle of complex, mission-critical federal enterprise deployments and their environments. - Work directly with customer engineering and GTM teams to define deployment scope, ensuring compliance with security controls and federal regulations. - Provide technical depth on strategic deployments; serving as the trusted expert on deployment, security, and platform architecture. - Contribute directly to the core product codebase to improve deployability, operability, and reliability across a variety of environments. - Translate field learnings and customer pain points into actionable product direction: scope requirements, define solutions, and drive implementation. - Build product extensions, integrations, and automation using Cognition’s APIs and platform primitives to unblock deployments. - Serve as the key technical and connective link between the Federal team and core infrastructure engineering teams. - Handle escalated technical issues and provide architectural judgment requiring deep debugging and systems analysis. ### What We Value - Technical depth and the judgment that comes from seeing many deployments - Product instinct — you synthesize feedback into solutions, not just feature requests - Builder mentality — you’d rather ship something than wait for someone else to build it - Credibility with engineering teams, both internal and customer-side - An automation-first mindset—you look to engineer repeatable solutions to operational challenges. - A collaborative approach to problem-solving, bridging the gap between internal and external teams. - Comfort operating across many contexts simultaneously ### Requirements - Strong engineering foundation with a proven ability to build, debug, and maintain complex, distributed systems. - 2+ years of experience as a software engineer. - Experience working within the government or working in a government focused company. - Direct experience in, implementing compliance and security controls required for federal or highly regulated environments. - Proficiency in Python, TypeScript, or similar; comfort navigating unfamiliar codebases - Have a track record of pursuing excellence at high levels, in any domain - Have operated cross-functionally—whether at a startup wearing multiple hats or by driving product/commercial thinking at a larger company ### You might excel if…. - Have built or contributed to software at companies known for engineering rigor and want the broader impact of a foundational role. - Enjoy hard, ambiguous problems without obvious solutions and thrive on the autonomy to figure them out. - Have a high tolerance for ambiguity, intensity, and sustained effort when the mission-critical nature of the work demands it. ### Our Commitment **Equal Opportunity.** Cognition is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of any protected characteristic under applicable law. We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for candidates with disabilities throughout the hiring process - please let us know if you need any. Cognition also considers applicants with criminal histories consistent with the SF Fair Chance Ordinance and similar local laws. **Data Privacy and Arbitration:** By submitting your application, you agree to our Global Applicant and Job Candidate Privacy Notice. For US applicants, by submitting your application, you agree to the Applicant Arbitration Agreement. [View posting at Cognition AI](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/cognition/589326d3-9dc0-447e-ae0c-972b808f831d/application) ## About Cognition AI Applied AI lab building autonomous software engineering agents and tools that let enterprise engineering teams delegate production work. Series E · 200–500 people ## Similar jobs [PVM](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/pvm) ### [Sr. Forward Deployed Software Engineer](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/c78d2cf66fe42e86) Arlington, VA Remote 2w ago Pay not posted [Innodata Inc.](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/innodata-inc) ### [Senior Full-Stack Software Engineer](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/763910a63a58b8b4) Washington, DC Remote 3w ago Pay not posted [Amazon (incl AWS)](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/amazon-incl-aws) ### [Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE), AWS Forward Deployed Engineering, US Government](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/91438c07da633c6c) Denver, CO · Jessup, MD · +4 more New · 3d ago $143,700–$213,800 [Agile Defense](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/agile-defense) ### [AI/ML Data Engineer](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/c3c3e24e5b3f92a3) Arlington, VA On-site 7w ago Pay not posted [Red Cell Partners](https://nextmove.md/fde/companies/red-cell-partners) ### [Senior/Staff Full Stack Software Engineer, Federal](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs/f2b085ebb8b7bbc3) Seattle, WA · Mclean, VA Remote 9d ago $180,000–$240,000 - [Compare senior FDE salary ranges](https://nextmove.md/fde/salary/senior) - [Similar jobs in Washington, DC area](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs?region=dmv) - [Similar jobs that build what the customer runs](https://nextmove.md/fde/jobs?role=builds-for-customers) Hiring at Cognition AI and want this page changed or removed? Email info@nextmove.md and we take it down. Employer postings · [How we read postings](https://nextmove.md/fde/method)