Senior Platform Engineer, Operating System SME

At Leidos Australia, our work goes beyond a job title. We design, build, operate and support the systems, services and capabilities that help protect and advance the Australian way of life.

Backed by a global organisation of more than 40,000 people, our Australian team of around 2,000 has partnered with government, defence and national security customers for more than 30 years. We deliver mission-critical solutions where reliability, trust and purpose matter.

Leidos is a destination for people who want their work to have purpose, their contribution to be recognised, and their career to grow without needing to fit a single mould. Meaningful work is supported by benefits, flexibility and career pathways that help you grow while balancing life outside work. This includes:

• Flex Your Way – Tailor work to your life with options including Life Days (up to 12 extra days off per year), part-time arrangements, job sharing, and compressed hours.
• Wellbeing That Matters – Free access to Headspace and MeQuilibrium, plus dedicated wellness spaces to support your mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing.
• Learn Without Limits – Access over 120,000 on-demand courses, alongside technical, project management, leadership, and professional development opportunities.
• Work That Makes an Impact – Contribute to nationally significant projects that matter, solve complex challenges, and accelerate your career through unique growth opportunities.
• Build Your Future – Whether you're deepening technical expertise or preparing for leadership, we'll invest in your development every step of the way.
• And Much More – These are just a few of the ways we invest in our people and help them thrive.

You’ll join a team where people work with integrity, inclusion, innovation, agility, collaboration and commitment. In practice, that means sharing ownership, solving complex problems together and staying connected to the customer context, the purpose behind the work and how each role contributes to meaningful outcomes.

The Civil Digital Modernisation business delivers IT services to Australian Federal and State Government departments and agencies to accelerate digital modernisation and ensure secure, resilient, and adaptive environments that meet evolving regulatory, compliance, and business needs. Our approach integrates advancing data, AI, cloud, and automation delivering agility, security, efficiency, and innovation at scale.

The Senior Platform Engineer, Operating System SME is responsible for the implementation, sustainment, and continuous improvement of enterprise Windows Server and Red Hat Enterprise Linux Standard Operating Environments.

The role works closely with Windows and Unix engineering teams to develop, test, deploy, maintain, and govern secure and supportable operating system builds. This includes operating system lifecycle planning, patching, security hardening, configuration management, automation, vulnerability remediation, monitoring, upgrades, and end-of-support management.

The role collaborates with infrastructure, application, database, cybersecurity, architecture, and service-management SMEs to ensure operating system services support the end-to-end technical and business requirements of the customer.

• Lead the development, testing, implementation and maintenance of Standard Operating Environments for Microsoft Windows Server and Red Hat Enterprise Linux, including approved images, templates, configuration baselines, build procedures and lifecycle plans across physical, virtualised, private cloud, public cloud and hybrid environments.
• Maintain secure and supportable operating system platforms through security hardening, configuration management, patch assessment and deployment, vulnerability remediation, upgrades and end-of-support planning, working collaboratively with cybersecurity and platform teams to manage technical and operational risk.
• Coordinate with infrastructure, application, database, storage, network, backup, identity and monitoring specialists to ensure operating system builds meet compatibility, performance, security, recovery and end-to-end service requirements.
• Improve consistency and efficiency through automation of operating system provisioning, configuration, validation, patching, compliance checking, health checks and reporting, using technologies such as PowerShell, Bash, Python, Ansible, Red Hat Satellite and equivalent configuration and automation tools.
• Provide technical leadership for complex Windows and Red Hat incidents, root-cause analysis, monitoring, performance and capacity management, backup and recovery, resilience, change activities and vendor escalations, while maintaining accurate SOE designs, configuration standards, lifecycle plans, support guides and operational documentation.

We are looking for someone who brings judgement, curiosity and a collaborative approach to work that matters.

• You have experience implementing, maintaining and supporting enterprise Microsoft Windows Server and Red Hat Enterprise Linux environments, including developing, testing, deploying and governing Standard Operating Environments and managing their upgrade, maintenance and end-of-support lifecycle.
• You bring practical Windows Server capability across areas such as Group Policy, Active Directory integration, PowerShell, patching, security baselines, event logging and performance monitoring, alongside Red Hat Enterprise Linux experience including package and repository management, systemd, SELinux, identity integration, shell scripting, patching and logging.
• You understand operating system security hardening, vulnerability remediation, privileged access, identity and access management and secure configuration, together with the relationships between operating systems and compute, storage, networking, backup, virtualisation, applications, databases, monitoring and security services.
• You have experience automating operating system management using tools such as PowerShell, Bash, Python, Ansible, Red Hat Satellite or Azure Automation, and supporting Windows or Red Hat workloads hosted on VMware, Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, private cloud or comparable enterprise platforms.
• You can lead complex operating system engineering activities while working inclusively with Windows, Unix, infrastructure, application, database, cybersecurity, architecture, vendor and service-management teams, bringing structured troubleshooting, clear communication, strong documentation and thoughtful planning and prioritisation.

This role requires the successful applicant to be an Australian citizen, hold and be able to maintain a NV-1 security clearance.

If this role interests you, we encourage you to apply. We value different experiences and are interested in the capability and potential you could bring.

Certain roles may be subject International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) requirements which may limit persons who hold dual nationality with certain proscribed countries from accessing material, or in the case of dual Australian-U.S citizens, may require the candidate to obtain a U.S. Persons Abroad authorisation from the U.S DDTC.

Our hiring process is designed to be straightforward, respectful and easy to navigate. If your skills, experience and qualifications look aligned with the role, our Talent Acquisition team will contact you to discuss the next stage. You can expect:

• An initial conversation with our Talent Acquisition team
• An interview with the hiring manager or interview panel

We’ll let you know what to expect before each stage, including who you’ll meet and how to prepare. If you need any adjustments or support during the process, please let us know.

If this sounds like a role where you can make an impact and continue to grow, we’d like to hear from you. Please apply via the “Apply Now” button with your resume. If you have any questions about the role or recruitment process, please contact [email protected].

If you're looking for comfort, keep scrolling. At Leidos, we outthink, outbuild, and outpace the status quo — because the mission demands it. We're not hiring followers. We're recruiting the ones who disrupt, provoke, and refuse to fail. Step 10 is ancient history. We're already at step 30 — and moving faster than anyone else dares.

The Leidos pay range for this job level is a general guideline only and not a guarantee of compensation or salary. Additional factors considered in extending an offer include (but are not limited to) responsibilities of the job, education, experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as internal equity, alignment with market data, applicable bargaining agreement (if any), or other law.