Senior DevOps Engineer

Aker Systems was founded in 2017 by a team of experienced technology professionals who recognised an opportunity to provide highly secure enterprise data platforms to large organisations. We build and operate ground-breaking, ultra-secure, high performance, cloud-based data infrastructure for the enterprise. Our proprietary technology solutions drive performance and reduce costs while helping our clients to improve the management and sharing of data across their organisations. In 2024, Aker Systems won the Breakthrough Culture Awards highlighting growth companies putting culture first. In 2020 Aker Systems was recognised as a 'One to Watch' on the Sunday Times Tech Track. The Company was also recognised at the Thames Valley Tech Awards 2020; winning the Thames Valley Tech Company of the year, the Emerging Tech Company and High Growth Tech Business categories. We encourage people of all different backgrounds and identities to apply. We are committed to maintaining an inclusive, and supportive place for you to do your very best work.

We are seeking a Senior DevOps Engineer (Contract) to support the evolution of our secure, scalable platform hosted on Microsoft Azure. This role is hands-on and delivery-focused, ideal for an experienced contractor who thrives in cloud-native, infrastructure-as-code environments and can operate with autonomy while integrating closely with internal and client-facing engineering teams. As part of the Product Engineering team, you'll help shape the infrastructure backbone of our proprietary platform, working with technologies like Terraform, Kubernetes, Kafka, and GitHub Actions, all within a high-security, regulated context.

Key Responsibilities

• Design, build, and operate infrastructure on Azure, leveraging Terraform and Terragrunt as part of our platform automation stack
• Develop and maintain CI/CD pipelines using GitHub Actions and GitLab CI
• Deploy and manage containerized workloads using Kubernetes (AKS)
• Collaborate with software engineers and solution architects to ensure deployment consistency, environment parity, and system security
• Support secure configuration of networking, identity, and access management in Azure
• Help integrate platform components with client environments, participating in deployments, troubleshooting, and documentation
• Drive observability and resilience across environments using tools like Prometheus, Grafana, and OpenTelemetry
• Troubleshoot and resolve issues across infrastructure, containers, and deployment pipelines
• Contribute to internal and client-facing infrastructure documentation and support materials

Tech Stack & Tooling

• Cloud Platforms: Azure (primary), with some AWS, GCP exposure beneficial
• IaC Tools: Terraform, Terragrunt
• CI/CD: GitHub Actions, GitLab CI
• Containerization & Orchestration: Docker, Kubernetes (AKS)
• Messaging/Eventing: Kafka
• Data & Search: Apache Spark, OpenSearch
• Architectures: Microservices, event-driven, distributed systems
• Observability: Prometheus, Grafana, OpenTelemetry

What We're Looking For

• Minimum 5-8yrs of proven experience in a DevOps engineering capacity, with strong exposure to Azure-native services (e.g., ARM, VNet, Key Vault, AKS)
• Deep hands-on knowledge of Terraform and Terragrunt for cloud infrastructure automation
• Practical expertise in deploying, maintaining, and troubleshooting Kubernetes clusters in production
• Familiarity with Kafka and event-driven or streaming-based systems
• Experience building and managing CI/CD pipelines using GitHub Actions and/or GitLab
• Strong problem-solving, diagnostic, and debugging skills in cloud-native environments
• A clear, concise communicator who can document and collaborate effectively across distributed teams and clients
• A proactive, solution-oriented mindset with the ability to take ownership and deliver in time-bound contractual roles
• Comfortable working independently, while integrating smoothly into broader engineering workflows

Soft Skills & Mindset

To succeed in this role, you should embody:

• A delivery-first approach, with strong attention to automation, consistency, and security
• Resilience under pressure, especially when supporting production environments or working with client deployments
• A collaborative attitude, able to align with cross-functional teams while operating autonomously
• A passion for clean infrastructure, documentation, and continuous improvement
• A contractor's mindset—able to add value quickly, manage ambiguity, and uphold quality standards

Aker Systems Attributes

At Aker we work as a team, we are collaborative, hardworking, open, and delivery obsessed. There is no blame culture here: try things, and take responsibility for the outcomes. You are always part of the wider Aker. We help out our colleagues and take pride in successfully achieving difficult tasks. We run towards problems and help solve them. Communicate always, do so accurately and in a timely fashion.

In return, we offer a competitive salary, 25 days holiday (excluding bank holidays), Company Paid Medical Insurance, Life Assurance (4x times basic salary), Pension scheme, Perks at Work, Cycle Scheme, Tech Scheme and Season Ticket Loan. Plus, a list of voluntary benefits including Dental Insurance, Critical illness cover and Virtual GP.

Equal Opportunities

Aker Systems fosters a diverse environment that encourages openness in its communications and is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all people regardless of race, religion, gender or sexual orientation, age, marital status, national origin, citizenship status, disability, veteran status or other personal characteristics. We embrace differences of opinion and diversity because they help challenge us and find new groundbreaking technical solutions.