Position Title: Senior Developer
Closes: TBC
Salary Range/Classification: TBC depending on qualifications and experience Term: Fixed-term till 31 December 2016
Contact: TBC
Open to: The position is open to Australian citizens and residents who have approval to work in Australia.
Organisational Context
The Australian Access Federation (AAF) is an incorporated entity that was established to provide a National Identity Federation to facilitate electronic communications and collaboration within and
between universities and research institutions in Australia and overseas. The AAF provides access to over 1 million end-users and has a subscription base drawn from Australian higher education institutions and research organisations such as the Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), as well as many state-based research support organisations. The AAF also has a number of subscribed local and international commercial organisations that provide products or services to the Australian higher education and research sector.
For further information about the AAF go to: www.aaf.edu.au.
Vision
The Australian Access Federation’s Vision is:
To be the authoritative provider of access management services for Australian education and research.
Mission
The Australian Access Federation’s Mission is:
Your Opportunity
This position is responsible for designing, developing and operating a range of web-based and backend applications that meet the needs of a growing and evolving Identity Federation. Software development activities and operation of supporting infrastructure are equally important components within this position. The position also provides a high level of technical guidance and support to AAF subscribers and stakeholders to ensure "best practice" processes and technologies are used when developing systems for use with the AAF. The position reports to the General Manager, AAF and works on a day-to-day basis as part of a highly skilled Technical Team.
Key Result Areas and Responsibilities
1. Design, develop, document, test and evaluate software solutions in line with the AAF’s Business Plan, Technical Roadmaps and projects.
2. Liaise with AAF stakeholders to analyse users’ needs and resolve problems.
3. Prepare and install solutions by determining and designing system specifications, standards and programming.
4. Research related products, build prototypes and make necessary infrastructure and software recommendations.
5. Contribute to system and services documentation for both users and developers.
6. Foster partnerships with key groups of interest to the AAF, including maintaining a watching brief over technical and policy developments with international Federations and, where appropriate, bring these developments to the attention of the AAF Team.
7. From time to time, undertake Research and Development activities through community collaboration and engagement.
8. In conjunction with other AAF technical staff assist with the delivery of the day-to-day operations of the Federation, including:
a. monitoring the availability of the Federation's systems;
b. providing general support to AAF subscribers through the AAF Support Desk; c. resolving technical support problems and issues;
d. development and delivery of high quality documentation; and
e. acting as a point of contact for new subscribers wanting to connect their service(s) to the Federation.
9. Comply with software development and project management procedures and processes. 10. Provide support to the General Manager AAF and Technical Team as directed.
Key Selection Criteria:
Essential:
1. Highly developed technical, analytical and problem solving skills in the field of Identity and Access Management.
2. Proven experience in agile software development of scalable web applications including:
7+ years experience in software development with most recent focus being on solving hard problems using Ruby and building web applications in Rails. Previous experience with Java to assist with maintenance existing environments would be highly regarded.
HTML, CSS and JS frameworks as appropriate to support modern web application development
Unit, Integration and Functional code testing
Continuous Integration tools
Development workflow based around issue tracking and real time collaborative systems e.g. slack
Git version control
Participation in full peer review for all code developed by the team
Experience using, contributing to and maintaining open source software 3. Proven experience in delivering operational environments. This must include:
Linux Systems Administration, in particular RHEL/CentOS
Securely deploying and administering MySQL, Apache web servers and Java servlet containers
Using Ansible, Puppet, Chef or similar deployment tools
Adhering to change processes/windows to ensure system availability of 99.99%+. 4. Proven experience in providing input into technical policy and process development and
Technical Roadmaps.
5. Proven ability to be flexible and willing to learn new languages/concepts and share them with the team.
6. Ability to communicate effectively (verbally and in writing) with team members and stakeholders and maintain effective working relationships with a wide range of external stakeholders.
7. Excellent organisational skills including an ability to prioritise tasks effectively and meet deadlines.
Desirable:
1. Experience of Shibboleth and SAML based Federation technologies.
2. Knowledge and understanding of other identity management protocols such as OpenID Connect and OAuth2.0.
4. Experience with automated, continuous deployment of new software releases.
5. Experience deploying and managing services in cloud hosted environment such as AWS or OpenStack.
6. Experience with the development of systems for higher education and research. 7. Previous experience working in a virtual team.
Qualifications:
Tertiary qualifications in computer science, information technology or engineering together with extensive industry experience and proven expertise of successful software development.
Reporting Relationships
The position reports to the General Manager, AAF.
Core Accountabilities
1. Provide a customer focussed service to subscribers, which supports all aspects of the business of the AAF, and which clearly demonstrates that customer satisfaction is paramount.
2. Work independently with initiative and a degree of autonomy, given broad direction. 3. Demonstrate energy, initiative and creativity in all job aspects, and in particular through
efficient and quality focussed commitment to work practice.
4. Apply, develop and extend job-specific, professional and organisational knowledge to strive for professional growth and excellence in performance.
5. Create and maintain effective working relationships with all stakeholders and demonstrate exemplary professionalism at all times.
6. Openly demonstrate values of: trust, integrity, honesty, fairness, and reliability, conveying a strong work ethic and clear commitment to a harmonious work environment.
7. Comply with all relevant and appropriate instructions, legislation, policies, and procedures. 8. Adhere to the principles applicable to a “Position of Trust”, and ensure that information and
data is protected.
9. Maintain a professional appearance at all times.
10. Work and act safely and take all reasonable care to protect personal health and safety and the health and safety of others.
Other Job Related Information
1. The position is a full time position, with normal office hours from Monday through Friday. Flexible working hours will be supported subject to prior approval and where this does not impact the ability of the incumbent to carry out the duties of the position.
2. Some travel may be required for interstate trips within Australia.
3. The position is based at the Brisbane Office. Applicants are required to be physically located in Brisbane and eligible to work in Australia.
4. An office space will be provided, although flexible arrangements including working from home will be supported where this does not impact on the incumbent's ability to carry out the duties of the position or burden AAF with material additional costs or OH&S compliance obligations. 5. This role operates as part of a virtual team. It is essential that the successful candidate feels
