Senior Cloud Engineer (Java & AWS) (Remote, Full-Time) [AS314]

About Smart Working

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Our mission is simple: to break down geographic barriers and connect skilled professionals with outstanding global teams and products for full-time, long-term roles. We help you discover meaningful work with teams that invest in your success, where you’re empowered to grow personally and professionally.

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About the Role

As a Cloud Engineer (Backend / DevOps-leaning), you will take responsibility for designing, building and maintaining AWS infrastructure using Terraform and Infrastructure as Code. This is an ongoing, long-term opportunity focused on reliable cloud infrastructure and its supporting delivery processes.

You will manage EC2 and other core infrastructure components, support CI/CD pipelines for infrastructure changes, and implement and maintain security and compliance controls.

Responsibilities

• Develop, maintain and improve AWS cloud infrastructure using Terraform and Infrastructure as Code (IaC).
• Strengthen and improve existing IaC configurations, infrastructure reliability and platform maturity.
• Own, maintain and optimise CI/CD pipelines, primarily using GitHub Actions, with Jenkins integrations where applicable.
• Implement and improve software supply-chain security processes, including Software Bills of Materials (SBOMs), container image signing and verification.
• Improve AWS monitoring, alerting and operational visibility across the platform.
• Manage Docker-based container deployments and orchestration using ECS and/or Kubernetes.
• Support ECS Anywhere deployments running across self-managed EC2 instances.
• Work with AWS services, including EC2, ECS, RDS, Aurora, DynamoDB and Lambda.
• Develop and enhance backend microservices, primarily written in Java.
• Implement new backend features and functionality supporting role-based access control (RBAC).
• Develop backend capabilities for metrics ingestion and processing.
• Implement backend functionality supporting multi-tenancy.
• Manage application deployments, troubleshoot infrastructure issues and resolve CI/CD pipeline failures independently.
• Support cloud and on-premises deployment environments, including opportunities to improve consistency between them.
• Identify opportunities to improve platform reliability, performance, security and delivery quality.
• Contribute to cloud cost optimisation while maintaining a cloud-agnostic approach and avoiding unnecessary vendor lock-in.
• Identify technical gaps, propose improvements and contribute proactively to product and platform development.
• Collaborate with other engineers, share technical knowledge and challenge technical decisions constructively.
• Use AI-assisted development tools responsibly, reviewing and taking ownership of generated code and integrations.

Requirements

• 5 years of senior-level hands-on experience in cloud engineering, platform engineering or DevOps, with the ability to independently own infrastructure and backend development work.
• 5 years of strong practical experience with AWS infrastructure and core services, including EC2, ECS, RDS/Aurora, DynamoDB and Lambda.
• 3 years of experience with Java-based backend services, or relevant backend development expertise applicable to Java microservices.
• Strong hands-on experience with Terraform and Infrastructure as Code (IaC).
• Proven experience designing, maintaining and improving CI/CD pipelines, ideally using GitHub Actions. Equivalent experience with GitLab CI/CD or Jenkins is acceptable where transferable expertise can be demonstrated.
• Knowledge and practical experience of software supply-chain security, including SBOMs, signed container images and image verification.
• Experience implementing and maintaining cloud monitoring and alerting solutions.
• Hands-on experience with Docker, containerized services and container orchestration using ECS and/or Kubernetes.
• Strong backend development experience, with the ability to independently implement new features and functionality in microservices.
• Ability to develop backend functionality involving access control, metrics ingestion and multi-tenancy.
• Experience troubleshooting production infrastructure, deployment pipelines and backend services.
• Understanding of platform reliability, maintainability, security and continuous improvement.
• Ability to work independently, take ownership of technical decisions and contribute beyond assigned development tasks.
• Strong collaboration, knowledge-sharing and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to propose and justify technical improvements constructively.

Nice to Have

• Experience developing frontend features and functionality, particularly around multi-tenancy and dashboard sharing.
• Experience integrating metrics visualisations using native frontend graphing libraries, including migrating dashboards from Grafana.
• Experience with Kubernetes deployments across on-premises and cloud environments.
• Knowledge of security and compliance frameworks, including ISO 27001, Cyber Essentials and secure SDLC practices.
• Experience with cloud cost optimisation (FinOps) and cloud-agnostic infrastructure.