Lead Cloud Engineer

What You'll Do A successful Lead Cloud Engineer will lead the design, automation, deployment, and operational support of cloud services, Azure platforms, and on-premises datacenter environments. This role will partner with application, infrastructure, security, and operations teams to deliver reliable, secure, scalable, and highly automated cloud and hybrid infrastructure solutions. Responsibilities: Lead cloud engineering activities for Azure platforms and hybrid environments, including infrastructure provisioning, deployment automation, platform reliability, and operational readiness. Manage and support Azure services such as Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Container Apps (ACA), Azure Firewall, Azure Front Door, Application Gateway, Azure App Service, Azure Networking, Key Vault, Monitor, and related platform services. Manage and support on-premises datacenter environments and hybrid infrastructure platforms, including Rancher, Linux-based systems, virtualization or container platforms, networking dependencies, and integration with Azure cloud environments. Build, maintain, and improve Infrastructure as Code using Bicep and Terraform, with focus on reusable modules, standards, governance, and secure deployment practices. Design, implement, and maintain CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins, GitHub, and GitHub Actions for application and infrastructure deployments. Drive automation for environment provisioning, configuration management, release management, monitoring, and operational support tasks. Partner with application teams to onboard workloads, troubleshoot deployment issues, improve release quality, and standardize cloud and DevOps practices. Collaborate with security and infrastructure teams to implement secure networking, access controls, secrets management, vulnerability remediation, and compliance requirements. Provide technical leadership, mentoring, documentation, and best-practice guidance to cloud, DevOps, infrastructure, and cross-functional teams. Participate in incident resolution, root cause analysis, platform improvements, and continuous improvement initiatives for reliability and operational efficiency. What You Will Need to be Successful: Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience. 8+ years of experience in Cloud Engineering, DevOps, Platform Engineering, Systems Engineering, Datacenter Operations, or related technology roles. Strong hands-on experience with Microsoft Azure cloud services, Azure networking, container platforms, and production operations. Experience with AKS, Azure Container Apps, Azure Firewall, Azure Front Door, Application Gateway, App Service, and related Azure platform components. Hands-on experience with on-premises datacenter management, including compute, storage, networking, Linux systems, backup/recovery coordination, monitoring, and operational support. Strong experience with Infrastructure as Code using Bicep and Terraform. Hands-on experience building and managing CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins, GitHub, and GitHub Actions. Strong Linux administration and scripting experience, with practical knowledge of Bash, PowerShell, or similar automation tools. Experience managing or supporting on-premises datacenter platforms, hybrid infrastructure, Rancher, Linux systems, and containerized workloads. Solid understanding of source control, branching strategies, release management, deployment governance, and environment promotion processes. Ability to troubleshoot complex applications, infrastructure, networking, pipeline, and platform issues across cloud and hybrid environments. What You May Need to be Successful: Relevant Azure certifications, Kubernetes certifications, or DevOps-related certifications are preferred. Demonstrated success leading cloud modernization, platform automation, migration, datacenter modernization, or DevOps transformation initiatives. Experience with observability tools, log analytics, alerting, dashboards, SLO/SLA reporting, and operational metrics. Experience working with security frameworks, policy-as-code, cloud governance, vulnerability management, and compliance controls. Experience with multi-cloud or hybrid cloud environments, including integration between Azure and on-premises infrastructure. Strong communication skills with the ability to explain technical topics clearly to engineering, security, operations, and leadership stakeholders. Ability to manage multiple priorities while maintaining high standards for quality, security, documentation, and operational excellence. We have great people here and are looking for more. Come join us! Follow us: Facebook Instagram LinkedIn X YouTube Equal Employment Opportunities at First Advantage First Advantage is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to providing a workplace and recruitment process that is free from unlawful discrimination, harassment, and retaliation. Employment decisions at First Advantage are based solely on qualifications, merit, and business needs. We do not discriminate in any aspect of employment on the basis of race, color, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, religion, creed, sex, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital or family status, pregnancy, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, veteran or military status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.