Protect our Land, Ascend with Us!

Ascension is seeking an experienced Cybersecurity & Zero Trust Subject Matter Expert to support the design and implementation of secure, cloud-native enterprise solutions focused on Identity, Credential, and Access Management (ICAM), identity governance, and Zero Trust security principles.

The ideal candidate will bring deep expertise in cybersecurity architecture, identity management, cloud security, and enterprise access control strategies to support modernization initiatives involving large-scale document management platforms, data repositories, and mission-critical information systems.

This role is intended for a senior cybersecurity professional who understands how to translate security requirements into practical technical architectures that protect sensitive information while enabling authorized users to efficiently access mission data. The successful candidate will have experience designing identity-centric security models, implementing least-privilege access controls, supporting authentication and authorization frameworks, and advising stakeholders on cybersecurity risk mitigation.

The candidate should be comfortable working in complex environments requiring collaboration among cybersecurity teams, enterprise architects, system developers, data engineers, and mission stakeholders. The successful candidate will be self-driven, analytical, and capable of developing security solutions in environments where requirements evolve as modernization activities progress.

Summary of Contractor Role

The Cybersecurity & Zero Trust Subject Matter Expert III provides specialized cybersecurity architecture and advisory support for enterprise technology modernization efforts. The SME will support the development of secure cloud-based platforms by applying Zero Trust Architecture principles, ICAM frameworks, identity governance practices, and cybersecurity engineering methodologies.

For this effort, the SME will help ensure that enterprise document management capabilities incorporate appropriate security controls for authentication, authorization, identity lifecycle management, role-based access control, privileged access management, and protection of document-level and metadata-level information.

The successful candidate will support activities such as cybersecurity architecture development, security requirements analysis, identity management strategy development, technical design reviews, security control assessments, and collaboration with enterprise architecture and cloud engineering teams.

The SME will help customers establish secure processes and technologies needed to manage access to enterprise information while supporting scalability, interoperability, and future system migration efforts.

The position supports requirements associated with developing a secure, multi-tenant enterprise document management environment utilizing cloud-native capabilities, ICAM services, and Zero Trust security principles.

Day-to-Day Activities and Responsibilities

• Develop and evaluate Zero Trust security architectures supporting enterprise cloud environments.
• Design and recommend ICAM solutions supporting authentication, authorization, identity lifecycle management, and access governance.
• Analyze cybersecurity requirements and translate mission objectives into technical security solutions.
• Develop security architecture documentation, diagrams, standards, and technical recommendations.
• Evaluate identity management approaches including:
  • Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)
  • Attribute-Based Access Control (ABAC)
  • Least privilege access
  • Privileged access management
  • Identity federation
• Support implementation of cloud security controls across enterprise platforms.
• Collaborate with cloud architects, system engineers, application developers, and mission stakeholders to ensure security requirements are incorporated into designs.
• Conduct cybersecurity architecture reviews and identify security risks, vulnerabilities, and mitigation strategies.
• Support security engineering activities related to:
  • Authentication mechanisms
  • Authorization models
  • Encryption approaches
  • Data protection controls
  • Audit logging
  • Security monitoring
• Develop cybersecurity recommendations, briefings, technical reports, and decision documents for government leadership.
• Participate in technical meetings, architecture working groups, and Integrated Project Teams (IPTs).
• Review technical designs for compliance with cybersecurity frameworks and federal security requirements.
• Support documentation of security policies, procedures, standards, and operational processes.
• Provide subject matter expertise during system modernization, migration, and integration activities.
• Assist with evaluating security impacts associated with enterprise application integration and API-based architectures.