Value Stream Architect with Security Clearance

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Job description

Fearless Guides creates the conditions for organizations and their people to thrive.
As a division inside Fearless, we're part of its digital services integrator model to unlock the power of organizations, people and tech. Through community, people, and organizational enablement, our division aims to improve outcomes and lives. We help teams identify issues, optimize flows, and adopt new behaviors. And we empower leaders to be effective in their roles, optimizing strategies and breaking down silos. Our holistic approach to people and organizational development streamlines every aspect of our customers' workflows so they can achieve their missions. In this way, we give organizations the peace of mind that their most valuable asset - their people - have everything they need to succeed.
Benefits Eligibility:
Full-time team members are eligible for benefits upon beginning employment at Fearless
1099 team members are not eligible for Fearless benefits
Our people make us who we are. We believe that every member of the Fearless team has something to share, and we value the unique viewpoint you'll bring to our community. But we value your community, too, so we offer fulfilling work that stays in balance with the rest of life. Because everyone has different needs, desires, and goals, our benefits offer the choices and flexibility that our team members need to live well and succeed. Here are a few highlights of our benefits package, for full-time team members, exclusively:
Life-friendly schedules
Family-friendly workplace
We cover 75% of your premium for our health, dental and vision plans and 50% of the premium for one additional family member.
Remote work stipend
Safe Harbor 401(k) plan with employer contributions (current match = 4%) and immediate vesting
We offer 20 days of accrued PTO, 12 company holidays, and two week-long office closures for Fearless Guides employees to take a team-wide break: 1) the week between Christmas and New Year's and 2) the first week of July.
Compensation:
TX, Residents: $136,710 (min) - $181,141 (mid) - $225,572 (max) Location: The selected candidate will primarily work on-site at the customer's location in San Antonio, Texas, 3-5 days per week. Candidates must live within a commutable distance (90 miles) of San Antonio. Hybrid work options may be considered after the first year. Travel may be required up to once a quarter for out-of-state client engagements or Fearless-related activities, including meetings at our Headquarters in Baltimore. Fearless is seeking a Value Stream Architect (VSA) to join our dynamic and diverse team of 250+ employees. In this pivotal role, you will support the United States Air Force's defensive cyber warfare operations by designing, analyzing, and optimizing value streams-defined as the end-to-end flow of activities across processes, system interfaces, and requirements that deliver value to the mission. As our inaugural VSA, you will be instrumental in shaping our value stream management approach, driving continuous improvement, and fostering collaboration across the organization. You will also serve as a bridge builder between business and IT, mentoring and guiding teams toward operational excellence.
This role is critical to driving significant organizational change, ensuring that Fearless remains at the forefront of defensive cyber warfare operations. The VSA will play a key role in translating high-level goals into actionable plans that align with our mission-critical objectives and will be deeply aligned with Team Topologies principles to optimize team structures and value delivery.
Strategic Leadership and Flow Optimization Organizational Design and Team Topologies Implementation: Reevaluate and restructure organizational and technology team structures using the principles of Team Topologies. Your focus will be on creating team structures optimized for fast flow, minimizing dependencies, and aligning communication paths with architectural constraints.
Continuous Delivery (CD) Models: Lead initiatives to achieve Continuous Delivery by eliminating bottlenecks and delivering stable, rapidly evolving solutions. Mentor teams in CD practices and Team Topologies concepts, fostering an environment where value is consistently delivered efficiently and without unnecessary friction.
Cyber Mission Architecture: Collaborate with subject matter experts to structure and refine value streams that directly enhance mission-critical operations. Your role involves facilitating the integration of strategic objectives into these value streams, ensuring they contribute to the overall effectiveness of cyber defense efforts.
Consultation and Technical Expertise Cyber Warfare Platform Optimization: Collaborate with technical teams to support the optimization of cyber warfare platforms, ensuring they are aligned with value stream management principles. Focus on advising organizational changes and process improvements that enhance platform performance, resilience, and enable fast, autonomous operations.
Flow Framework and Team Topologies Leadership: Act as the principal Flow Advisor within Fearless, leveraging the Flow Framework and Team Topologies to drive enterprise-level optimization across stream-aligned teams. Contribute to thought leadership in value stream management, promoting the adoption of these best practices across the organization.
Enterprise Systems Architecture: Apply your experience with enterprise systems architecture frameworks such as DoDAF, TOGAF, or similar, ensuring that the technical solutions you develop are robust, scalable, and aligned with both mission objectives and organizational goals.
Collaboration and Stakeholder Engagement Stakeholder Relationships: Represent Fearless at a local level, building and maintaining strong relationships with the USAF and other key customers. Ensure that technical strategies are aligned with broader mission objectives and foster collaboration across teams.
Implementation of Organizational Changes: Collaborate with Fearless counterparts to implement organizational changes throughout the project, ensuring alignment with strategic goals and contributing to continuous improvement, with a specific focus on adopting and scaling Team Topologies practices.
Systems Engineering Integration: Apply systems engineering principles to inform and enhance stakeholder engagements, ensuring that technical solutions are not only aligned with strategic goals but also grounded in sound engineering practices.
Functional Role and Continuous Improvement Value Stream Analysis and Mapping: Lead the analysis and mapping of current value streams, identifying bottlenecks, inefficiencies, and opportunities for improvement. Collaborate with cross-functional teams to define future-state value stream architectures that align with strategic objectives and Team Topologies.
Optimization and Automation: Develop and implement strategies to optimize value streams, including process redesign, automation, and necessary organizational changes. Promote a culture of continuous improvement, encouraging collaboration and knowledge sharing, and ensuring alignment with Team Topologies principles.
KPI Development: Design and implement key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the effectiveness of value stream improvements and track progress. Use these metrics to drive decision-making and prioritize investments for systemic improvement across value streams.
Platform and Tooling Influence: Influence enterprise-level decisions regarding platforms and tools, continuously guiding teams toward improving CI/CD and mission capability delivery, aligned with Team Topologies.
Qualifications Core Qualifications and Hard Requirements (Must Haves) Experience: A minimum of 10 years of demonstrated related working experience.
Clearance: Active TS/SCI clearance.
Systems Engineering: Exposure through education or relevant experience.
Value Stream and Team Topologies Expertise: Demonstrated experience in supporting value streams, identifying dependencies, delivery constraints, and continuous improvement opportunities, with a focus on implementing and scaling Team Topologies.
Leadership: Proven ability to serve as a trusted advisor to senior leadership and guide teams through complex technical and organizational challenges.
Federal Experience: Experience working on DoD projects or in highly regulated environments. Preferably with the Airforce.
Organizational Change: Experience supporting organizational or team change initiatives, with a focus on fostering collaboration and systemic improvement through the application of Team Topologies principles.
Communication: Strong interpersonal skills with effective verbal and written communication capabilities, particularly in translating technical topics for non-technical stakeholders.
Team Dynamics: Proficient in fostering healthy team dynamics and implementing people-focused practices.
Mentorship and Training: Experience identifying training and skill development opportunities across the enterprise, with the ability to run teams through a Dojo if required.
Coaching: Experience leading and coaching teams of Software Engineers, SREs, Test Engineers, and Data Engineers.

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