The Commissariat General for Refugees and Stateless Persons is a federal independent administration. The mission of the CGRS is to offer protection to individuals who, upon returning to their country of origin, would risk persecution or serious harm.

In accordance with Belgian, European, and international standards, the CGRS examines each request for international protection in an individual, objective, and impartial manner.

Within the CGRS, a modernization initiative has been launched, translated into the eDossier program. This is a very ambitious program, consisting of several projects with a very tight schedule. To further shape and develop the program, we are looking for strong profiles who are willing to commit temporarily until the delivery of the program, currently planned at least until the end of 2027.

One of the profiles we are seeking is an expert (+10 years of experience, mandatory) hands-on Solution Engineer. We expect this person to flawlessly and independently translate high-level solution architecture into implementation architecture, as well as actually implement it. You will form a team with other experienced, highly competent, and motivated individuals. You can always rely on the knowledge and competencies of our enterprise architect.

A description of the job responsibilities and required competencies can be found below. If you are inspired by the core mission of the CGRS and have a match with the job responsibilities and required competencies, do not hesitate to apply.

Those looking for a pure lead and/or advisory function, please refrain from applying. The emphasis is on analysis, design, and implementation. Those seeking 4 days of telework will also be disappointed. To foster team spirit and the startup of the initiatives, we ask for presence in the office 3 days a week. Our offices are located next to Brussels South station.

• Degree in computer science, higher education short or long type, obtained at a recognized European college or university, is mandatory (the diploma must be present together with the CV within the pro unity platform),
• Continuously self-training to stay up to date with the latest sustainable trends and innovations within IT,
• 10 years of hands-on experience with design/definition and development of APIs,
• 10 years of hands-on experience with development and integration of microservices,
• 10 years of hands-on Java SE experience,
• 5 years of hands-on experience with Java SE10+,
• 5 years of hands-on experience with software design (cloud, API, microservice, event),
• 5 years of hands-on experience with event-driven architecture and systems,
• 5 years of hands-on experience with cloud (native) development, preferably Azure Cloud,
• 3 years of hands-on experience with integrating PaaS offerings, preferably Azure Cloud,
• 3 years of hands-on experience with the use of NoSQL databases,
• 3 years of hands-on experience with implementing and optimizing CI/CD pipelines, preferably within Azure DevOps,
• 3 years of hands-on experience with implementing/setting up, optimizing, and maintaining development, test, acceptance, and production environments within a (hybrid) cloud, preferably Azure Cloud,
• 1 year of hands-on experience with the Java framework Quarkus,
• 5 years of experience with (collaborative) work within agile delivery teams,
• Knowledge of Event Driven and/or Behavioral Driven Development is an asset,
• Knowledge of Domain Driven Design is an asset,
• Knowledge of European interoperability is an asset,
• Knowledge of existing building blocks and services within the federal government context is an asset,
• Ability to propose alternative solutions and make recommendations regarding choices to be made, taking the full context into account,
• Good listener, flexible attitude, and able to communicate with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

I. Languages

Due to the nature of the job responsibilities and the client base (bilingual working environment), as well as our internal way of working, a good knowledge of English as well as Dutch or French is required.

II. Job Responsibilities

• You have a broad and diverse set of competencies that enable you to design, develop, manage, and dismantle IT solutions within your team’s scope.
• You are an energetic Solution Engineer with a passion for IT and a positive can-do mentality. You are a team player who works as a core member of a multidisciplinary and cross-functional team, with the primary driver being the client.
• As a Solution Engineer, you contribute to achieving the team's goal. You support the CGRS in delivering quality products to our clients. You collaborate with other engineers, analysts, and business stakeholders. Therefore, a commitment to joint problem-solving, advanced design, and delivery is essential.
• As a Solution Engineer, you must understand the entire stack & IT-design solution, so that you can guide the team in designing and developing secure & robust solutions, bringing applications into production, and maintaining the application in collaboration with other team members.
• You use your technical expertise and experience to contribute to all sprint events (planning, refinements, retrospectives, demos).
• You continuously develop your own expertise while gathering, updating, and sharing knowledge about new tools & practices within the team.

III. The Interview

Based on the pre-selection of the platform, candidates will be invited for an individual interview. During the interview, soft skills and motivation will be assessed, as well as understanding of the role and hard skills (required competencies, level of experience, level of expertise, language proficiency).

Calls for interviews are conducted in waves/contingents of a maximum of 5 people. If none of the candidates from a wave or contingent are selected by the jury, candidates from the next wave are invited for an individual interview. This process is repeated until the jury has selected a candidate.