Lead DevOps Engineer

TL;DR

Lead DevOps Engineer: Define, build, and operate CI/CD, runtime, and observability foundations for Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) across multi-site environments with an accent on high availability, change safety, and rapid incident recovery. Focus on designing progressive delivery patterns, standardizing API platform pipelines, and leading operational readiness through wargaming and performance testing.

Location: Hybrid role (3 days in office, 2 days remote) in London or Bristol, United Kingdom.

Company

hirify.global is the UK's largest telecommunications company, leveraging digital infrastructure and AI to revolutionize connectivity and customer experience.

What you will do

• Own reference architecture and paved paths for services on Kubernetes (Helm Charts), infra as code (Terraform), and Git-based workflows.
• Design progressive delivery (Argo CD/Flux, canary/blue-green) and automated database/network change patterns.
• Standardise API platform pipelines for Apigee / API gateways and NaaS service onboarding, including contract testing.
• Define service SLOs/error budgets; engineer robust alerting, runbooks, and incident response across multi-region estates.
• Lead operational readiness: wargaming, failover simulations, capacity management, and performance testing.
• Embed security gates in CI/CD; manage vulnerability scanning and endpoint protection; enforce secrets and key management.

Requirements

• Strong Linux fundamentals and troubleshooting skills (system performance, networking, storage).
• Practical understanding of L7/L4 load balancing, service mesh, DNS/GSLB, certificate management, and API connectivity patterns.
• Hands-on Kubernetes experience in production (deployments, upgrades, debugging, cluster/workload operations, managing secrets, network policies).
• Automation mindset: scripting (Python/Bash) and experience with Terraform/Ansible/Helm/Kustomize/GitOps.
• Strong knowledge of API gateway/service mesh patterns and secure ingress.
• Experience designing observability for serverless systems (logs/metrics/traces) and implementing distributed tracing and dashboards using tools like Elastic and Grafana.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with CAMARA and TMF-931; API aggregator marketplace exposure.
• Kubernetes certification (e.g., CKA/CKAD).
• Technical leadership experience, including mentoring junior engineers.
• Good understanding of foundational AWS services (EKS, IAM, VPC, S3, CloudWatch) and hybrid connectivity patterns.
• Sound understanding of authentication and authorisation patterns (OpenID Connect, OAuth 2.0, LDAP/Active Directory).

Culture & Benefits

• 10% on target bonus and BT Pension scheme (minimum 5% employee, 10% company contribution).
• Life Assurance Cover and exclusive colleague discounts on BT broadband, TV, and sports packages.
• From January 2025, equal family leave: 18 weeks at full pay, 8 weeks at half pay.
• Enhanced women’s health support, including menopause symptoms and cancer screenings.
• 25 days annual leave (not including bank holidays), increasing with service.
• 24/7 private virtual GP appointments for UK colleagues.
• World-class training and development opportunities.