Senior Network & Cloud Automation Lead

National Physical Laboratory; Metropolitan Borough of Solihull; Remote; GBP 85,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive pension

Life assurance

Generous annual leave

Job summary

National Physical Laboratory (UKTL) is seeking a Senior Network Connectivity Lead to design, build and maintain secure network infrastructure across on‑premises and cloud platforms. You will lead lifecycle management of networking technologies, drive automation, and deliver observability solutions to support mission-critical research and testing.

You will mentor engineers, collaborate across security, operations and delivery teams, and contribute to strategic direction while ensuring robust,

Qualifications

• Significant experience designing, implementing and supporting enterprise networking environments.
• Expert knowledge of switching, routing, firewalls, VPNs, LAN and WAN.
• Strong experience in cloud networking and infrastructure services.
• Proven expertise in Infrastructure as Code, automation and configuration management.
• Experience building and maintaining CI/CD pipelines.
• Experience working in secure, mission-critical environments.
• Ability to collaborate effectively with technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Design, build and maintain secure, resilient network infrastructure across on-premises and cloud platforms.
• Lead the lifecycle management of networking technologies, including switches, routers, firewalls, VPNs, LAN and WAN services.
• Act as a senior technical escalation point, providing 3rd line support and resolving complex infrastructure issues.
• Work with project teams to design and implement technology solutions meeting business and operational requirements.
• Develop and maintain IaC, automation tooling and CI/CD pipelines to improve efficiency and consistency.
• Implement and enhance security controls, including RBAC, secrets management and platform hardening.
• Deliver observability and monitoring solutions to improve service reliability and performance.
• Collaborate with security, operations, research and delivery teams to drive continual improvement through automation.
• Create and maintain high-quality technical and operational documentation.
• Mentor and coach engineers to develop technical capability.
• Engage with suppliers and technology partners to resolve issues and support service improvements.
• Contribute to strategic direction of network and connectivity services across UKTL.

Skills

Enterprise networking

Cloud networking

Infrastructure as Code

Automation

CI/CD pipelines

Security controls

Observability

Mentoring engineers

Cross-team collaboration

Tools

Cloud platforms

CI/CD tools

Job description

National Physical Laboratory (UKTL) is seeking a Senior Network Connectivity Lead to design, build and maintain secure network infrastructure across on‑premises and cloud platforms. You will lead lifecycle management of networking technologies, drive automation, and deliver observability solutions to support mission-critical research and testing.

You will mentor engineers, collaborate across security, operations and delivery teams, and contribute to strategic direction while ensuring robust,