Lead Automation Engineer

Sopra Steria Ltd; Farnborough; On-site; GBP 59,000 - 70,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading technology company based in Farnborough seeks an experienced Automation Lead to design and implement an Automation Strategy within the Aerospace Defence and Security Sector. The successful candidate will work on a large project, ensuring systems are scalable, resilient, and secure while collaborating with cross-functional teams. An active SC clearance is preferred, and salary can reach up to £70K depending on experience with comprehensive benefits including a car allowance and private medical insurance.

Benefits

£5,400 car allowance

25 days annual leave

Private medical

Life assurance

Pension

Generous flexible benefits fund

Qualifications

• Ideally hold active SC clearance or above.
• Must be eligible for Developed Vetting (DV).

Responsibilities

• Create and maintain an Automation Strategy across a secure environment.
• Collaborate to provide operational and engineering support for a secure cloud service.
• Develop workflows and tooling to automate processes.
• Provision, manage, and optimise infrastructure.
• Produce designs and specifications.
• Maintain observability of the platform.
• Handle change management and capacity planning.
• Implement software configuration management processes.

Skills

Strong Windows and Linux sysadmin expertise

Proficient with programming languages (JavaScript, Python, C#, C++, Go, Java)

Competent with scripting languages (PowerShell, Bash, SQL)

Background with VMware Cloud Foundation stack (vSphere, vSAN, NSX)

Familiarity with Configuration Management and Infrastructure as Code

Experience with CI/CD pipelines and tools (Gitlab)

Knowledge of system interoperability and APIs

Networking and database administration

Job description

Can you lead on Automation and influence technology decisions?

We want you to join our team within the Aerospace Defence and Security Sector and combine software engineering and operations expertise, design an automation strategy, automate tasks, observe system health and optimise infrastructure. Can you be responsible for ensuring our systems are performant, resilient, scalable, and secure? This is an opportunity to work on a very large project within Defence.

You should ideally already hold active SC clearance or above. The position will ultimately require you to hold Developed Vetting (DV), so you must be eligible,

Based on site on Farnborough.

What you'll be doing:

• Create and maintain an Automation Strategy across a highly secure environment.
• Collaborating as part of a cross-functional team to provide operational and engineering support for a large-scale secure cloud service.
• Domain orchestration. Developing workflows and tooling to automate processes and operations.
• Provisioning, managing and optimising infrastructure.
• Produce component designs and specifications of any size and complexity.
• Maintaining observability of the platform.
• Change management and capacity planning.
• Ensure that appropriate software configuration management processes are implemented.

What you’ll bring:

• Strong Windows and Linux sysadmin expertise.
• Proficient with one or more high level programming languages, JavaScript, Python, C#, C++, Go or Java.
• Competent with multiple scripting languages such as PowerShell, Bash or SQL.
• Background working with the core VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) stack. Including vSphere, vSAN, NSX and the Aria Automation suite.
• Familiarity with Configuration Management and Infrastructure as Code (Iac). Including supporting tooling such as Terraform and Ansible.
• Experience building Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines and supporting tooling such as Gitlab.
• Knowledge of system interoperability and application interfaces. E.g. RESTful, API, Swagger.
• Networking and database administration know-how.

If you are interested in this role but not sure if your skills and experience are exactly what we’re looking for, please do apply, we’d love to hear from you!

Employment Type: Permanent
Location: Office based in Farnborough.
Security Clearance Level: Eligible for SC and DV Clearance.
Internal Recruiter: Jane
Salary: To £70K Dependant on experience.
Benefits: Level £5,400 car allowance, 25 days annual leave with the option to buy additional days, private medical, life assurance, pension, and generous flexible benefits fund

Loved reading about this job and want to know more about us?

Sopra Steria’s Aerospace, Defence and Security business designs, develops and deploys digital solutions to Central Government clients. The work we do makes a real difference to the client’s goal of National Security, and we operate in a unique and privileged environment.

We are given time for professional development activities, and we coach and mentor our colleagues, sharing knowledge and learning from each other. We foster a culture in which employees feel valued and supported and have pride in their work for the customer, delivering outstanding rates of customer satisfaction in the UK’s most complex safety- and security-critical markets.