[Hiring] Search Software Engineer @Manpower/itec

Role Description

Search Software Engineer

Location: Remote

Required Clearance: Public Trust

ManpowerGroup Public Sector (MGPS) provides Skilled Experts and Leading-Edge Solutions to Support Our Nation’s Most Critical Intelligence, Defense and Civilian Missions. MGPS specializes in solving our clients’ diverse linguistic, technical and data management challenges created by the dramatic rise in the volume, variety and complexity of open source data. We harness machine learning, artificial intelligence and the latest data acquisition and mining tools, paired with expert human skills to provide customized solutions for every customer.

Qualifications

• Search & Indexing Fundamentals
• Data & Transformation
• Query & Testing
• Development
• AI-Assisted Analysis & Development
• Analysis & Communication

Requirements

• Hands-on experience with Lucene-based search platforms (Solr, OpenSearch, or Elasticsearch)
• Understanding of index schemas/mappings: field types, stored vs. indexed, doc values, multi-valued fields
• Familiarity with text analysis pipelines: tokenizers, filters, analyzers (index-time vs. query-time)
• Ability to inspect an index directly — querying fields, checking term vectors, using analysis APIs
• Ability to trace raw source data through an ingestion pipeline into indexed fields
• Comfort reading structured/semi-structured data formats (XML, JSON)
• Understanding of data normalization and transformation patterns
• Skill in crafting targeted test queries to expose behavioral differences
• Experience with structured or Boolean query languages (experience with custom parsers a plus)
• Ability to design and execute parity/regression test cases at multiple levels: index content, query results, ranking, facets, highlighting
• Java proficiency — able to read, debug, and make targeted changes to Java codebases
• Familiarity with Maven or Gradle build systems
• Proficiency using AI coding assistants (e.g. Claude Code) to investigate complex problems, generate hypotheses, and draft code changes
• Ability to formulate precise, context-rich prompts that produce actionable results from an AI assistant
• Comfort working in an AI-augmented development workflow: reading and critically evaluating AI-generated output before applying it
• Ability to identify root cause of parity differences and attribute them to a specific layer (ingestion, schema, analyzer, query parser)
• Able to produce clear, actionable defect reports for developers

Desired Skills

• Experience with custom Lucene analyzers or codec plugins
• Python scripting (data inspection, test automation, reporting)
• Familiarity with OpenSearch REST API and index management
• Experience with SQLite or other lightweight databases for test result storage
• Search engine certifications (Elastic, OpenSearch)
• Experience with parallel/comparative testing frameworks
• Background in a domain with complex structured data (legal, scientific, patent, medical)

Education Level

• Bachelors Degree