Senior DevOps Engineer

Zen Internet Ltd; Greater Manchester; On-site; GBP 75,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

You’ll be a senior member of Zen Internet Ltd.'s Engineering Reliability Team, collaborating with development, engineering, and operations to support and improve the development estate. You’ll help drive reliability, automation, and efficient incident handling so Zen can focus on innovation and priorities.

Reporting to the DevOps team manager, you’ll demonstrate strong DevOps expertise, lead on automation, and contribute to a culture of proactive monitoring and reliability engineering across

Qualifications

• Extensive DevOps experience within ISP/Managed Services or similar complex environments.
• Proven ability to automate and optimize deployment, release, and configuration processes.
• Strong knowledge of SRE practices and incident handling.

Responsibilities

• Deliver end-to-end build, release, deployment, and configuration activities.
• Be a technical escalation point and participate in 24/7 escalation rota if required.
• Document changes clearly for operations and support teams.
• Develop and maintain monitoring and self-healing infrastructure with dashboards.

Skills

DevOps

SRE

Automation

CI/CD

Kubernetes

AWS

Azure DevOps

GitLab

Puppet

Elasticsearch

Kibana

Scripting

Linux/Windows

Tools

Azure DevOps

GitLab

Puppet

Kubernetes

AWS

CloudFormation

Elasticsearch

Job description

**This role is not eligible for visa sponsorship. Candidates must have the unrestricted right to work in the UK to be considered**

Overview

You’ll be a senior member of the Engineering Reliability Team that will work closely with Zen’s development, engineering, and operations centre teams. You’ll Work alongside the Development and engineering teams, to support, maintain, and consistently improve the development estate so the development teams can focus and innovate constantly to drive Zen’s business and the teams’ priorities.

Reporting to the DevOps team manager, you must have an excellent track record in DevOps roles and the drive and attitude to succeed. Zen are committed to investing in and developing you – we believe that everyone can lead and the way we do has a huge impact on our people and play a vital part in our success.

The DevOps team will be responsible for the design and implementation of applications' build, release, deployment and configuration activities. Other responsibilities include working within multi-functional teams to gather requirements, evaluate tools, implementing/updating solutions, building and executing test plans, provision environments, application performance reviews, assist migration of Legacy systems, and triaging and fixing operational issues.

You’ll ensure incidents are run smoothly and ensure that operational knowledge is available and shared. As a senior you will be a point of escalation, demonstrating problem solving skills, the ability to learn quickly and adapt your skills and knowledge.

As a service provider we operate many technologies, so you’ll have the skills to work with experienced Lead DevOps engineers, Systems Engineers and developers leveraging frameworks, standards, and defined operational process to make the unfamiliar comfortable and familiar. Over time we’ll increasingly leverage SRE principles to further optimize and enhance capabilities – it’s a great opportunity to get in at the start and shape this journey.

Objectives

• Deliver continuous incremental improvement of systems and infrastructure
• Take end to end ownership and responsibility for development infrastructure and systems
• Be a technical escalation point and eventually be part of a 24/7 escalation rota
• Document as you go – enough so your colleagues can follow what’s been done and why
• Drive tasks forward with energy and enthusiasm
• Create proactive monitoring solutions using standard tooling - mainly Zabbix and Elastic
• Conduct RCA (Root Cause Analysis) for incidents
• Develop standard operational procedures and documentation
• Develop and maintain self-managing infrastructure services and dashboards.
• Identify cost-saving opportunities
• Provide advice on DevOps standards and practices

• Provide coaching and mentoring to Software and DevOps Engineer peers

Key Responsibilities

Experience

• Worked and succeeded as a DevOps Engineer
• Ideally, experience working in an ISP, Telco or other Managed Services environment or able to demonstrate experience in a complex heterogeneous environment
• Comfortable working with automation tools (Azure DevOps, GitLab, Puppet)
• Worked in complex networking and firewall environments
• Production use of multiple AWS capabilities and Kubernetes debugging
• Demonstratable experience in dealing with technical debt effectively
• Comfortable working with SRE principles and lean methodologies

• Very strong problem-solving skills are essential – understanding of DevOps and SRE concepts with the ability to apply key techniques to unfamiliar problems
• Ability to influence others in matters of standards and best practice, especially individuals outside of our team
• Comfortable working with automation tools (Puppet, Git) and CI/CD pipelines (Azure DevOps) with complex integrations and test frameworks
• Comfortable with Elasticsearch log standardisation, Kibana dashboard creation and data analysis skills
• Able to code to a good level - this isn’t a developer role but you need scripting skills to succeed
• AWS hands on – Cloud formation, Route53, S3, DynamoDB, Cloud-watch, Lambda, Security, and troubleshooting
• Certificate management and automation
• Strong troubleshooting and diagnosis skills
• Able to write documentation that covers what your peers and operations need to know
• Knowledge of Database systems and models
• Windows Server, SQL Server, IIS and Linux

Interpersonal Skills

We value interpersonal skills and responsible teamwork. You should be able to:

• Patient & friendly with excellent interpersonal skills - demonstrate a natural aptitude for dealing with people
• Influence and lead
• Strong attention to detail
• Happy working and supporting a small closeknit team
• Take and give feedback to tune future actions and behaviours
• Embrace and demonstrate Zen values
• Be kind, understanding, and listen to others
• Be organized

Impact You'll Make

You will be influencing and contributing to Zen’s long-term goals and joining a family that believes business should be a force for good. We’re a company committed to improving the lives of our people, creating a better future through our community and charity work, and ensuring that we look after our environment.

Perhaps that’s why we’re officially a Great Place to Work and have achieved Carbon Neutral Plus status and B Corp Certification!