Transit Technology Infrastructure Engineer

Ryan Mahoney

Ryan Mahoney

Director of Product, FirstWho

“It's rare to find someone who keeps the buses running while also talking clearly to non-technical teams. At this level, we need an engineer who can own a subsystem without needing constant hand-holding. They have to balance fixing a broken real-time feed with explaining the delay to an operations manager. Too many candidates focus only on code and ignore how infrastructure affects people. We need people who listen well enough to understand the actual impact of a server outage on riders.”

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Competency Questions

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Transit Technology Infrastructure & Operations

Encompasses the management of core infrastructure, data systems, integrations, and governance required for transit technology operations at the mid-level, with focus on independent subsystem ownership and incident response.

Core Infrastructure Operations

Independently manages infrastructure lifecycle tasks and troubleshoots common operational issues across physical and virtual components supporting transit systems.

Interview round: Hiring Manager Technical

Walk me through how you managed infrastructure spanning both cloud providers and on-premises hardware.

Positive indicators

  • Mentions specific hybrid architecture patterns
  • Discusses latency considerations for legacy integrations
  • Describes clear ownership boundaries with traditional IT

Negative indicators

  • Treats cloud and on-prem as identical without nuance
  • Ignores legacy system limitations
  • Unable to articulate workload placement logic

Attitude Questions

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Active Listening

The intentional cognitive process of fully concentrating on, understanding, and responding to verbal and non-verbal communication to accurately translate operational realities into technical requirements while maintaining safety and system integrity.

Interview round: Recruiter Screen

Describe a situation where you had to understand a complex issue reported by a non-technical user.

Positive indicators

  • Translates technical symptoms to operational impact
  • Validates user experience before troubleshooting
  • Maintains calm demeanor

Negative indicators

  • Talks over the user
  • Uses technical terms to explain user errors
  • Dismisses report as user error too quickly

Progression Framework

This table shows how competencies evolve across experience levels. Each cell shows competency at that level.

Transit Technology Infrastructure & Operations

6 competencies

CompetencyJuniorMidSeniorPrincipal
Core Infrastructure Operations

Performs routine maintenance and monitoring of infrastructure components under supervision, including server health checks, firmware deployments, and VM provisioning following established SOPs.

Independently manages infrastructure lifecycle tasks and troubleshoots common operational issues across physical and virtual components supporting transit systems.

Designs infrastructure upgrades and leads complex incident resolution efforts for physical and virtual infrastructure components supporting transit systems.

Defines long-term infrastructure strategy and drives innovation in transit hardware and systems.

Open Source Software Management

Uses open source tools following established guidelines and licenses, managing dependencies for internal engineering tools and ensuring version control compliance.

Manages dependencies and contributes bug fixes to upstream projects within the transit technology stack.

Selects strategic open source solutions and manages community relationships for transit technology stack components.

Drives open source adoption strategy and influences project roadmaps.

Performance & Reliability Engineering

Monitors system metrics and alerts on performance thresholds, including AVL server health monitoring and automated performance report generation.

Tunes system parameters and implements reliability improvements to optimize system performance and ensure high availability of critical transit technology services.

Leads capacity planning and designs for fault tolerance to optimize system performance and ensure high availability of critical transit technology services.

Defines reliability targets (SLOs) and drives continuous improvement culture.

Security, Compliance & Governance

Follows security checklists and reports vulnerabilities, including data anonymization for privacy protection and compliance procedure documentation for audits.

Implements security controls and conducts compliance audits to ensure transit technology systems adhere to security protocols and privacy regulations.

Designs security architectures and leads incident response planning ensuring transit technology systems adhere to security protocols, privacy regulations, and governance frameworks.

Sets organizational security policy and manages regulatory relationships.

System Integration & MaaS

Supports integration testing and documents interface specifications for transit system integrations and Mobility as a Service platforms under guidance from senior staff.

Builds integration connectors and manages data flow between disparate transit systems and Mobility as a Service platforms.

Architects multi-vendor integration solutions and manages stakeholder alignment for disparate transit systems and Mobility as a Service platforms.

Defines ecosystem integration strategy and partners with external MaaS providers.

Transit Data Standards & APIs

Assists in documenting API endpoints and validating data formats against standards, including GTFS feed validation, schedule data pipeline updates, and open data publishing following established procedures.

Develops and maintains API integrations and ensures data quality compliance across transit data systems and rider-facing applications.

Architects data exchange frameworks and resolves complex interoperability challenges ensuring data standards and API interfaces work across transit data systems.

Leads industry working groups on data standards and defines organizational data strategy.