About Agile Defense
At Agile Defense we know that action defines the outcome and new challenges require new solutions. That’s why we always look to the future and embrace change with an unmovable spirit and the courage to build for what comes next.
Our vision is to bring adaptive innovation to support our nation's most important missions through the seamless integration of advanced technologies, elite minds, and unparalleled agility—leveraging a foundation of speed, flexibility, and ingenuity to strengthen and protect our nation’s vital interests.
Title: Program Managers, Deputy Program Managers, Senior Project Managers & Project Managers (CBP)
Clearance: Active CBP Background Investigation (CBP BI) and EOD strongly preferred. We can begin processing for candidates who do not hold one. Some position may require an active Top Secret with SCI eligibility
Citizenship: U.S. Citizenship required
Location: Reston, VA and Ashburn VA - Hybrid 3-5 days, on-call requirements
Salary Range: Pipeline posting, varies by position
Signing Bonus: $10,000 for candidates with an active CBP BI. Payable after 90 days; standard terms apply.
The Work
U.S. Customs and Border Protection runs continuous operations across more than 300 land, air, and sea ports of entry, plus Border Patrol stations and the Air and Marine Operations Center. Delivering technical work into that environment is a different problem from delivering it into an office. You cannot take a checkpoint down on a Tuesday because the schedule says so. Change windows are narrow, some sites are hours from the nearest support, and a slipped date can mean an officer working without a tool they were told to expect.
We are hiring project and program managers to run delivery across that constraint. You will coordinate work spanning network, cloud, cybersecurity, and field deployment teams, manage commitments with the customer, and move work through federal change control and accreditation processes that set the pace whether or not your plan accounted for them.
One thing is worth knowing before you apply. This is not a role where the schedule is the job. The engineers here can build; what slows delivery is dependency, approval, access, and the gap between what a plan assumed about a site and what is true at that site. Managers who treat those as somebody else's problem do not do well here.
What Success Looks Like
Objective 1: Turn commitments into schedules that survive contact with a 24/7 environment
- Plans account for the change windows and site access constraints that actually govern the work, not the ones that are convenient to plan around.
- Dependencies between network, cloud, security, and field teams surface before they become a delay.
- Estimates come from the people doing the work, and get challenged rather than either accepted whole or overwritten.
- When a date moves, the customer hears it from you, with a reason and an option.
Objective 2: Give the customer a picture of the program that matches what is happening
- Status reporting tells the customer something they can act on rather than a color that covers a problem.
- Risks appear on the register while there is still time to do something about them.
- The customer stops arranging side conversations to find out how the work is really going.
- What you report measures delivery rather than activity.
Objective 3: Remove the obstacles that keep engineers from delivering
- Blockers get resolved at the lowest level that can resolve them, and escalate quickly when they cannot.
- Engineers spend their time on the work instead of chasing approvals, access, and equipment.
- Recurring administrative friction gets fixed at its source rather than absorbed again every month.
Where You'd Fit
We are hiring across several levels, and one of these roles is scoped by portfolio rather than by seniority. You do not need to pick one before applying. Tell us where you think you land and we will talk about it.
- Project Manager. You own a project's scope, schedule, and delivery. You make routine sequencing and resourcing calls yourself and bring the ones with customer impact to a review.
- Cloud Project Manager. You own delivery of the cloud workstream, including its dependencies on security and accreditation. You decide sequencing across builds, migrations, and authorization milestones.
- Senior Project Manager. You take the projects that arrive without a clear path, including the ones already in trouble when you get them. Other project managers check their approach with you before committing to a date.
- Deputy Program Manager. You own a defined slice of the program full time and step into the Program Manager's authority when they are unavailable. Escalations that would otherwise reach the Program Manager come to you first, and most stop there.
- Program Manager. You own whether the program delivers as a whole, including commitments you inherited and work you do not directly manage. You are the customer's counterpart when something goes wrong.
What You Bring
Minimum Qualifications
[Verbatim from the labor category, per level. These differ across Project Manager through Program Manager, including Deputy Program Manager. Note: a prior Agile Defense Deputy Program Manager performance profile exists and should be used as the baseline for that rung's qualifications and objectives once available, rather than drafted fresh. State the band honestly rather than publishing the highest bar. Required before publishing.]
Preferred Experience
- You have delivered technical work in a federal program where change control and accreditation set the pace.
- You have told a customer bad news early, and can describe how that conversation went and what it cost you.
- You have run delivery across teams you did not manage and had no authority over.
- You have taken over a project that was already behind and can say what you changed first.
- You hold an active CBP BI, a fitness determination at another DHS component, or an active DoD clearance. Any of these shortens your start date.
- You know enough about infrastructure, cloud, or security work to challenge an estimate without needing someone to translate it for you.
- PMP, agile delivery certifications, or equivalent are useful, but they are not a substitute for having delivered.
A note on timing
We are staffing this program now. If you already hold an active CBP BI and EOD, your start date is short and a $10,000 signing bonus comes with the role, payable after 90 days under standard terms. We would like to talk this week.
If you do not, we can begin processing a CBP BI for you. That takes months rather than weeks, so applying now means joining a pipeline rather than starting immediately. We would rather tell you that up front than have you find out after you apply.
Employee Benefits
Agile's benefits offerings include, dependent upon position, Health Insurance, Life Insurance, Paid Time Off, Holiday Pay, short-term and long-term Disability, Retirement and Learning and Development opportunities as well as other optional benefit elections.
Our Core Values
Employees of Agile Defense are our number one priority, and the importance we place on our culture here is fundamental. Our culture is alive and evolving, but it always stays true to its roots. Here, you are valued as a family member, and we believe that we can accomplish great things together. Agile Defense has been highly successful in the past few years due to our employees and the culture we create together.
What makes us Agile? We call it the 6Hs, the values that define our culture and guide everything we do. Together, these values infuse vibrancy, integrity, and a tireless work ethic into advancing the most important national security and critical civilian missions. It's how we show up every day. It's who we are.
- Happy - Be Infectious. Happiness multiplies and creates a positive and connected environment where motivation and satisfaction have an outsized effect on everything we do.
- Helpful - Be Supportive. Being helpful is the foundation of teamwork, resulting in a supportive atmosphere where collaboration flourishes, and collective success is celebrated.
- Honest - Be Trustworthy. Honesty serves as our compass, ensuring transparent communication and ethical conduct, essential to who we are and the complex domains we support.
- Humble - Be Grounded. Success is not achieved alone, humility ensures a culture of mutual respect, encouraging open communication, and a willingness to learn from one another and take on any task.
- Hungry - Be Eager. Our hunger for excellence drives an insatiable appetite for innovation and continuous improvement, propelling us forward in the face of new and unprecedented challenges.
- Hustle - Be Driven. Hustle is reflected in our relentless work ethic, where we are each committed to going above and beyond to advance the mission and achieve success.
Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities