Frontend Engineer

You'll work hand in hand with other engineers building out interfaces that match VA.gov designs, using the VA Design System (VADS) component library as your foundation — and you'll build and maintain that library itself. This includes taking new components from design and requirements through implementation, automated tests, Storybook documentation, and release, and maintaining and extending existing components: fixing bugs reported by teams across VA.gov and adding features while keeping backwards compatibility for teams already using them. These components consume and create data from the backend, and your input will help drive the direction and format of data endpoints; you'll communicate architecture choices to other team members and translate technical decisions into terms non-developers can understand clearly.

Accessibility is central to the role: you'll find and fix screen reader and keyboard issues so components meet WCAG 2.2 AA, testing by hand with VoiceOver (macOS and iOS) and NVDA and adding automated axe-core checks. You'll review pull requests from your teammates in the component library, and rotate through Tier 2 front-end support — reviewing changes to shared platform code across the vets-website, content-build, and vets-json-schema repos, and helping debug front-end CI issues such as flaky end-to-end tests.

You'll own releases and downstream integration: publishing new versions of the component library's npm package, upgrading vets-website to match, and fixing shared platform code when a component change requires it. You'll also develop and maintain the component library's developer tooling and standards — including its “spec-driven development” system for AI coding assistants (GitHub Copilot and Claude Code) and its GitHub Actions workflows — and keep documentation and the backlog current: Storybook stories and usage notes, component requirements documents, decision logs, and backlog issues for bugs, accessibility defects, and discovery work.

3+ years of experience with React and JavaScript, including web components and TypeScript (Stencil.js, JSX, Shadow DOM)

Strong CSS/SCSS skills, including USWDS, design tokens, and the VADS css-library package

A solid understanding of API design and how backend systems work — you'll help shape the direction and format of the data endpoints these components consume

Deep accessibility experience — WCAG 2.2 A/AA, ARIA, focus management, live regions, keyboard interaction, and hands-on testing with screen readers (VoiceOver, NVDA)

Strong testing background across component tests (Stencil e2e with Puppeteer, Jest), accessibility tests (axe-core), application tests (Cypress), and visual regression (Chromatic)

Experience with Storybook for component documentation

Experience publishing and maintaining npm packages, including monorepo and release tooling (Yarn/npm), backwards-compatible API design, and Git/CI-CD workflows (GitHub Actions)

The ability to write code that is a pleasure for other engineers to read and understand, and to communicate technical and architecture decisions clearly to both engineers and non-developers

Experience working in an Agile/Scrum environment with sprints and daily stand-ups

The ability to review and evaluate systems and software for adherence to government directives, standards, and guidelines

Strong code review and cross-team collaboration skills — you'll review PRs from many teams and write requirements documents, decision logs, and bug reports

Good judgment on scope — knowing when to enforce a rule in code versus document it as guidance