Lead Cloud Engineer

Job Description Description We are seeking a highly skilled and proactive Lead Cloud / DevOps Engineer to head our DevOps team and drive the organizations cloud and infrastructure strategy. This role is not just about managing pipelines or deployments its about leading people, processes, and platforms to achieve scalability, security, and operational excellence. As the Lead Cloud / DevOps, you will play a critical role in shaping our Cloud/ DevOps roadmap, mentoring engineers, and ensuring seamless collaboration with development, QA, and product teams. You will be responsible for designing modern Cloud / DevOps practices, driving automation, and ensuring robust infrastructure management across Cloud, on-premise, and hybrid environments. Key Responsibilities Leadership & Strategy : - Lead and mentor a team of Cloud / DevOps engineers, fostering a culture of automation, reliability, and continuous improvement. - Define and own the Cloud / DevOps vision, roadmap, and best practices aligned with organizational goals. - Collaborate with engineering leadership to design scalable, secure, and cost-optimized infrastructure solutions. - Act as the go-to person for all DevOps-related decisions, bottlenecks, and escalations. - Introduce new tools, frameworks, and practices that elevate productivity and system performance. DevOps & Cloud Operations - Design, implement, and manage CI/CD pipelines across multiple environments (dev, staging, production). - Lead cloud infrastructure design, leveraging AWS, Azure, or GCP managed services for compute, storage, databases, and networking. - Implement and oversee logging, monitoring, and observability frameworks (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, ELK, CloudWatch, Azure Monitor). - Ensure high availability, resilience, and disaster recovery through effective backup and failover strategies. - Establish and enforce infrastructure as code (IaC) practices using Terraform, Pulumi, or CloudFormation. - Drive containerization and orchestration strategies, including Docker and Kubernetes (EKS, AKS, GKE, or self-hosted clusters). Security, Compliance & Governance - Implement security best practices in identity management, secrets management, and access control. - Work closely with InfoSec teams to ensure compliance with industry standards and policies. - Proactively conduct infrastructure audits to identify gaps in cost optimization, performance, and security. Required Skills & Qualifications - 5 to 8 years of experience in DevOps, Cloud Engineering, or related roles, with at least 3+ years in a leadership capacity. - Proven expertise in designing and managing CI/CD pipelines with tools like GitLab CI, Jenkins, GitHub Actions, or Azure DevOps. - Strong hands-on experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP), including managed services. - Deep understanding of containerization and orchestration (Docker & Kubernetes). - Experience with monitoring, logging, and observability solutions. - Proficiency in IaC tools such as Terraform, Pulumi, or CloudFormation. - Strong scripting and automation skills in Bash, Python, or PowerShell. - Solid understanding of networking, security best practices, and cloud cost optimization. Preferred (Nice To Have) - Experience in hybrid-cloud and on-premises DevOps environments. - Knowledge of configuration management tools (Ansible, Chef, Puppet). - Exposure to multi-cloud, multi-tenant, or large-scale distributed systems. - Familiarity with FinOps (cloud cost management) practices. Soft Skills - Strong leadership skills with a track record of building and guiding high-performing teams. - Excellent problem-solving, troubleshooting, and decision-making abilities. - Exceptional communication and stakeholder management skills. - Ability to thrive in a fast-paced, technology-agnostic environment. - A growth mindset with a passion for automation, efficiency, and continuous learning. (ref:hirist.tech)