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Senior / Lead DevOps Engineer
Amber Labs | Permanent
Hybrid (Remote First) with Ad-hoc travel to Newcastle (once every 2 months)
Security Clearance: BPSS required
About Amber Labs
Amber Labs is an established UK technology consultancy helping organisations modernise through cloud, engineering, data, AI and user-centred design. We partner with government departments, enterprise organisations and highly regulated industries to deliver secure, scalable digital services that make a real impact.
As our portfolio continues to grow, we're looking for experienced Senior and Lead DevOps Engineers to join our engineering practice and support the delivery of a major public sector legacy transformation programme. This is an opportunity to play a key role in the modernisation of critical pension services, helping transform complex legacy technology into secure, resilient and scalable cloud-based platforms.
The Opportunity
You'll join a large-scale technology remediation and transformation programme focused initially on modernising a legacy State Pension platform.
The programme forms part of a wider strategic modernisation initiative, with similar transformation activity anticipated across other pension-related services. The objective is to move away from ageing legacy technology towards modern, cloud-based solutions using technologies including AWS, Java, APIs and React.
The programme is transitioning from design into development, with design and engineering activity running in parallel. Teams are currently ramping up ahead of a substantial development phase expected to continue for more than a year, followed by testing, service acceptance, transition and eventual live deployment.
This is not a straightforward migration project. The existing estate includes COBOL and other legacy technologies, with complex systems, integrations and business processes that need to be carefully understood before they can be modernised.
As a Senior or Lead DevOps Engineer, you'll help establish and evolve the cloud infrastructure, container platforms, networking and operational capabilities required to support the delivery of these modern digital services.
What You'll Be Doing
Cloud Infrastructure & Platform Engineering
- Design, implement and support secure, scalable and resilient cloud infrastructure within AWS.
- Build and maintain modern cloud platforms to support the development and operation of new pension services.
- Develop and improve containerised environments using Kubernetes and associated cloud-native technologies.
- Support the design and operation of infrastructure for APIs, integrations and modern application workloads.
- Ensure platforms are designed with security, resilience, scalability and operational efficiency in mind.
Kubernetes & Containers
- Deploy, manage and optimise containerised workloads across development, test and production environments.
- Build and support Kubernetes-based platforms suitable for complex, mission-critical services.
- Troubleshoot container, orchestration and platform issues across the delivery lifecycle.
- Improve the reliability, scalability and performance of cloud-native environments.
- Contribute to best practices around container security, deployment and operational management.
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Networking & Performance Optimisation
- Design and support cloud networking solutions appropriate for secure and complex enterprise environments.
- Investigate and resolve networking, connectivity and performance issues.
- Monitor and optimise platform and application infrastructure performance.
- Identify bottlenecks and implement improvements to enhance scalability, resilience and responsiveness.
- Support capacity planning and performance optimisation as services move towards live operation.
Automation & Operational Excellence
- Drive automation across infrastructure provisioning, deployment and operational processes.
- Support the development of efficient and reliable CI/CD and cloud delivery practices.
- Improve observability through effective monitoring, logging and alerting.
- Investigate and resolve infrastructure and platform incidents.
- Continuously improve platform reliability, resilience and engineering efficiency.
Collaboration & Technical Delivery
- Work closely with Software Developers, Front-End Developers, Testers, Product Managers, Business Analysts and other technical stakeholders.
- Contribute to technical discussions and help shape practical approaches to complex engineering challenges.
- Identify gaps, dependencies and technical risks, proactively seeking clarification where required.
- Challenge assumptions and requirements constructively, helping teams develop robust and sustainable solutions.
- Work effectively within multidisciplinary Agile delivery teams.
Additional Lead DevOps Engineer Responsibilities
Alongside the core technical responsibilities, the Lead DevOps Engineer will provide technical leadership across the DevOps and platform engineering function.
This will include:
- Leading the technical approach for cloud infrastructure, Kubernetes and platform engineering.
- Providing guidance and technical direction to Senior DevOps Engineers and wider delivery teams.
- Contributing to platform architecture and long-term engineering strategy.
- Driving standards, best practices and continuous improvement across the DevOps capability.
- Supporting technical decision-making across complex infrastructure, networking and performance challenges.
- Working with senior stakeholders to identify risks, dependencies and opportunities for improvement.
- Helping establish a strong DevOps culture focused on automation, reliability and operational excellence.
Skills & Experience
We're looking for Senior and Lead DevOps Engineers who have:
- BPSS Clearance, or the ability to meet the required clearance criteria.
- Strong commercial experience delivering and supporting AWS cloud environments.
- Hands-on experience with Kubernetes and containerised workloads.
- Strong understanding of container technologies and cloud-native platforms.
- Experience with AWS infrastructure and cloud services.
- Strong networking knowledge within cloud or enterprise environments.
- Proven experience investigating and resolving infrastructure and platform performance issues.
- Experience with performance tuning and optimisation across cloud platforms and applications.
- Strong troubleshooting and problem-solving skills.
- Experience working within complex, large-scale technology environments.
- The ability to work autonomously and take ownership of technical challenges.
- Confidence identifying gaps in requirements and proactively seeking the information needed to progress.
- Strong communication skills and the ability to work effectively with both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
- Experience working within Agile, multidisciplinary delivery teams.
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The Environment
You will be joining a growing delivery team working across a complex transformation programme. The planned team structure includes a Lead Software Developer, Front-End Developers, Full-Stack and Backend-focused Developers, Testers and DevOps specialists, with additional Senior and Lead DevOps capability being added.
The programme requires engineers who are comfortable operating in an evolving environment. Design and development will overlap, requirements will continue to mature, and successful candidates will need to be proactive in understanding existing systems, identifying technical challenges and helping shape the modernisation approach.
This is an excellent opportunity to work on a significant public sector transformation programme and help build the cloud platforms that will support the next generation of pension services. If you're passionate about AWS, Kubernetes, containers, cloud networking, platform reliability and performance optimisation, and enjoy solving complex technical challenges within large-scale transformation programmes, we'd love to hear from you.
What We Offer
- 25 days annual leave plus public holidays, giving you time to properly switch off and recharge.
- Private medical insurance with Bupa.
- Remote-first working, with access to our Liverpool Street office when you want to collaborate in person.
- Personal training budget to support your professional development.
- Perkbox membership, with access to discounts across retail, travel, dining, wellness and entertainment.
- Electric Vehicle Scheme after one year of service.
- Regular team socials and opportunities to connect across the business.
- Employer pension contributions.
- Referral scheme, offering up to £3,000 for successful hires.
- The opportunity to join a growing consultancy early and genuinely influence its direction and success.
Amber Labs is an equal opportunities employer. We are committed to creating an inclusive environment where everyone can thrive, regardless of background, identity or experience.
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