Senior Cloud Engineer

ESG; Houston (TX); Hybrid; USD 120,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

ESG is seeking a Senior DevOps/Cloud Engineer to lead design, implementation, and optimization of scalable cloud and on-prem infrastructure. You will mentor engineers, influence architecture, and drive automation, reliability, observability, and cost efficiency in a hybrid environment.

The role requires hands-on expertise across AWS/Azure/GCP, VMware, Docker, and Kubernetes, with Terraform or CloudFormation for IaC and a strong bias toward FinOps.

Qualifications

• 7-8+ years of experience in DevOps, Cloud, or Infrastructure Engineering.
• 5+ years designing and operating complex enterprise environments across Windows, Linux, and SQL-based systems.
• Strong expertise with Terraform and CloudFormation.
• Hands-on experience with VMware and container platforms: Docker/Kubernetes.
• Proficiency in scripting and automation using Python, PowerShell, Bash, and/or Go.
• Experience implementing observability and monitoring with Datadog.

Responsibilities

• Lead design and implementation of automated CI/CD pipelines.
• Architect, implement, and maintain cloud-native and hybrid infrastructure using Infrastructure as Code.
• Drive automation across provisioning, deployment, monitoring, and recovery processes.
• Design, implement, and maintain observability platforms, with a focus on Datadog for metrics, logs, traces, and alerting.
• Establish monitoring, SLOs, and alerting to improve reliability and reduce MTTR.
• Own and optimize cloud cost efficiency with cost controls.
• Mentor junior and mid-level engineers and contribute to technical standards and documentation.
• Create and maintain architecture diagrams and operating runbooks.

Skills

Cloud architecture

CI/CD pipelines

Scripting

Cloud platforms

VMware

Kubernetes

Docker

Terraform

CloudFormation

Datadog

FinOps

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/Engineering

Tools

Terraform

CloudFormation

Datadog

Jenkins

GitLab CI

Docker

Kubernetes

Job description

• THIS POSITION DOES NOT OFFER VISA SPONSORSHIP, NOW OR AT ANY TIME IN THE FUTURE*

About the Role:

• THIS POSITION DOES NOT OFFER VISA SPONSORSHIP, NOW OR AT ANY TIME IN THE FUTURE*

The Senior DevOps / Cloud Engineer will lead the design, implementation, and optimization of scalable, secure, and highly available cloud and on-prem infrastructure. This role partners closely with application development, security, and infrastructure teams to drive automation, reliability, observability, and cost efficiency across the organization. As a senior-level contributor, you will provide technical leadership, mentor engineers, influence architectural decisions, and own complex cloud and DevOps initiatives from design through production. The ideal candidate brings deep hands-on expertise in cloud platforms, virtualization, CI/CD, infrastructure as code, monitoring, and cloud cost optimization (FinOps) in hybrid environments. We are seeking a Mid-Senior DevOps Engineer with 8+ years of relevant experience who is eager to grow their skills and contribute to our dynamic team. This is a hybrid position, and we expect the candidate to work 2-3 days a week on-site at our office.

Responsibilities:

• Lead collaboration with application development teams to design and implement reliable, automated CI/CD pipelines
• Architect, implement, and maintain cloud-native and hybrid infrastructure using Infrastructure as Code best practices
• Drive automation initiatives across provisioning, deployment, monitoring, and recovery processes
• Design, implement, and maintain observability platforms, with a strong focus on Datadog for metrics, logs, traces, and alerting
• Establish monitoring, SLOs, and alerting strategies to improve system reliability and reduce mean time to resolution (MTTR)
• Own and optimize cloud cost efficiency, identifying savings opportunities and implementing cost controls without compromising performance
• Implement and maintain configuration management using tools such as Ansible, Puppet, or Chef
• Own and optimize VMware environments, ensuring high availability, scalability, and performance
• Serve as a senior escalation point for production incidents, performing root cause analysis and driving long-term remediation
• Partner with security teams to enforce infrastructure security, compliance, and best practices
• Lead disaster recovery planning, testing, and continuous improvement efforts
• Perform regular system performance tuning, capacity planning, and cost analysis
• Mentor junior and mid-level engineers and contribute to technical standards and documentation
• Create and maintain detailed architecture diagrams and operational documentation

Skills:

As a Senior DevOps/Cloud Engineer, you will design and optimize scalable cloud infrastructure across AWS, Azure, or GCP, providing technical leadership for automation and reliability initiatives. You will manage VMware and container platforms such as Docker and Kubernetes to support stable deployments across Windows and Linux environments. Leveraging scripting languages (Python, PowerShell, Bash, or Go) and infrastructure as code tools like Terraform or CloudFormation, you will drive standardized, automated provisioning and delivery. Experience with CI/CD tools including Jenkins, GitLab CI, and Git is essential for building efficient deployment pipelines. Strong operational knowledge of SQL Server, IIS, and monitoring platforms such as ELK, Prometheus, or Grafana will support production performance and troubleshooting in fast-paced, agile environments.

Requirements

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, Engineering, or a related field; advanced degree preferred
• 7-8+ years of experience in DevOps, Cloud Engineering, or Infrastructure Engineering
• 5+ years designing, operating, and optimizing complex enterprise environments across Windows, Linux, and SQL-based systems
• Strong expertise in enterprise data center technologies, including Storage platforms, Network switching and Security infrastructure
• Deep experience with at least one major cloud provider (AWS preferred; Azure or GCP acceptable)
• Strong hands-on experience with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, CloudFormation)
• Advanced knowledge of virtualization and container platforms: VMware (vSphere, ESXi, vCenter) and Docker/Kubernetes in production environments
• Proficiency in scripting and automation using Python, PowerShell, Bash, and/or Go
• Experience implementing observability and monitoring solutions, including Datadog
• Excellent communication and leadership skills with the ability to manage priorities, influence stakeholders, and lead technical initiatives

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience leading large-scale cloud migrations to AWS
• Strong SQL Server administration experience
• CI/CD expertise with Jenkins, GitLab CI, Git, Jira, or CircleCI
• Cloud cost optimization and FinOps experience (rightsizing, RI/Savings Plans, tagging, budgets)
• Ability to establish DevOps and cloud governance standards