Junior DevOps Engineer
12-Month contract - Inside IR35 - market rate
Manchester based - hybrid working - 2-3 days a week onsite
Banking sector
Key accountabilities
- Kubernetes and OpenShift engineering. Helps to build, configure and operate Kubernetes and OpenShift clusters and workloads for core banking, following the team's standards.
- Infrastructure as code. Writes and changes Terraform for cloud and platform resources, through reviewed and tested code.
- Internal developer platform. Contributes to the IDP, including Backstage catalogue entries, software templates and documentation, so product teams can self-serve safely.
- Continuous delivery. Helps to build and maintain delivery pipelines that build, test, secure and deploy core banking services.
- Helps to implement metrics, logs, traces and alerts, SLO dashboards and runbook automation.
- Control engineering. Helps to build the bank's resilience, security, change and audit controls into platforms and pipelines as automated checks.
- Own learning. Takes responsibility for building their skills and acting on feedback.
Responsibilities
Platform and delivery
- Carries out defined tasks on Kubernetes and OpenShift, such as namespace setup, deployments, resource quotas, upgrades and troubleshooting, following runbooks.
- Writes and updates Terraform modules and configurations, with peer review, and applies changes through the team's pipelines.
- Adds and maintains Backstage catalogue entries, software templates and docs, and helps product teams to use them.
- Builds and maintains stages of CI/CD pipelines, including build, test, security scanning, artefact management and deployment.
- Supports releases of core banking services, and checks that deployments work as expected.
- Writes scripts in Bash or Python to remove manual steps.
- Raises and updates tickets, and keeps documentation, handover notes and runbooks accurate.
Observability and reliability
- Helps to set up metrics, logging, tracing and alerting, using the bank's observability tools, such as Prometheus, Grafana and OpenTelemetry.
- Helps to define service level indicators and objectives (SLIs and SLOs), and to build SLO dashboards.
- Helps to turn runbooks into automation, such as scripted or automated responses to common alerts.
- Joins the on-call rota once trained, initially as a shadow or secondary responder, and takes part in incident reviews.
Control engineering and development
- Helps to build automated checks that enforce the bank's resilience, security, change and audit controls in platforms and pipelines, such as policy as code, scanning and approval gates.
- Keeps evidence of changes and controls, and follows the bank's change management and risk processes.
- Follows the bank's security and regulatory standards, and asks when unsure.
- Takes part in Agile ceremonies, including stand-ups, planning and retrospectives.
- Invests in their own development by working within the existing development framework, with regular feedback and objectives.
- Shadows and pairs with senior engineers.
Experience
Essential
- A degree or equivalent in a technical subject, or demonstrable practical experience through projects, apprenticeships, bootcamps, internships or placements.
- Basic experience of Linux, Git and scripting in Bash or Python.
- Understanding of containers and Kubernetes concepts, through study, projects or work.
- Understanding of CI/CD and infrastructure as code concepts.
- Clear communication and a willingness to ask for help early.
Desirable
- Previous experience in a DevOps, infrastructure, support or software role, internship or placement.
- Hands-on experience of Kubernetes or OpenShift, Terraform or a CI/CD tool.
- Exposure to Backstage or another developer portal.
- Certification such as CKA, Terraform Associate or a cloud fundamentals exam, or a commitment to obtain one.
- Exposure to a regulated environment such as banking.
- Interest in banking and financial services.