Automation Architect

This range is provided by NP Group. Your actual pay will be based on your skills and experience — talk with your recruiter to learn more.

Contract Details

• Contract: Automation Architect
• Start Date: ASAP
• Duration: 6 months
• Location: Remote - UK
• Rate: circa £550 - £590 per day outside of IR35
• Reference: 20059

Role Overview

This role is for a highly skilled and experienced Automation Architect responsible for the end‑to‑end delivery of on‑premise private cloud infrastructure automation solutions. The ideal person will bridge the gap between architectural design, process analysis, and hands‑on implementation, ensuring that infrastructure is provisioned and managed efficiently via Infrastructure as Code (IaC) principles utilizing a robust CI/CD pipeline orchestrated by Git runner technology. This automation will specifically target the deployment and management of environments hosting Containers (e.g., Kubernetes, OpenShift) and traditional Virtual Machines (VMs).

Responsibilities

• Strategy and Analysis
• Architectural Design: Design and document the target state architecture for private cloud infrastructure automation, ensuring scalability, security, and maintainability for both VM‑based and containerised platforms.
• Feasibility Analysis: Analyse and evaluate available on‑premise automation technologies, tools, and platforms (e.g. OpenStack, Ansible, Terraform, configuration management tools) to determine the optimal approach for implementing IaC and CI/CD within the private data centre.
• Process Flow Definition: Create detailed process flow diagrams and technical specifications outlining the complete lifecycle of private cloud infrastructure deployment and teardown through the automated pipeline.
• Tooling Selection: Recommend and justify the specific tools and technologies required for the CI/CD pipeline, Git runner orchestration, and IaC implementation targeting the private cloud environment.
• Development Guidance and Enablement
• Technical Leadership: Provide expert guidance and mentorship to development and infrastructure teams on best practices for IaC, CI/CD methodology, and Git runner configuration, specifically tailored for on‑premise automation.
• Platform Expertise: Guide development of IaC modules for provisioning and configuring resources required to host Containers and stand‑alone VMs.
• Standardisation: Define and enforce coding standards, security policies, and deployment patterns for all automated infrastructure deployments in the private cloud.
• Code Review: Participate in code reviews to ensure quality, efficiency, adherence to design specifications, and proper integration with the automation ecosystem.
• Delivery and Quality Assurance
• End‑to‑End Accountability: Maintain full accountability for the delivery and successful functioning of the developed on‑premise automation solutions.
• QA Testing: Design, implement, and execute comprehensive QA test cases and scripts to validate the functionality and idempotency of the automation outcome before release to client teams.
• UAT Participation: Actively participate in the User Acceptance Testing phase with client teams, gathering feedback on functionality, usability, and identifying defects or areas for improvement related to the automated provisioning of container and VM infrastructure.
• Defect Management: Triage, track, and manage all issues and enhancement requests arising from QA and UAT, ensuring their timely resolution.
• Documentation: Ensure all architectural designs, process flows, test results, and operational runbooks for the private cloud automation are accurately documented and maintained.

Required Skills and Qualifications

• Experience: Proven experience (5+ years preferred) in a similar role focused on on‑premise infrastructure, DevOps, or automation engineering.
• Must haves: Private cloud experience, Greenfield automation, Ansible/Terraform, GitLab, CI/CD.
• Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Deep expertise with at least one major IaC tool (e.g. Terraform, Ansible) for provisioning and configuration management, including integration with private cloud APIs (e.g. OpenShift, OpenStack).
• Private Cloud/Virtualisation: Strong expertise in virtualization technologies and platforms and managing the underlying infrastructure for VMs and container hosts.
• Container Infrastructure: Solid understanding of the infrastructure requirements for hosting and managing container orchestration platforms (e.g. Kubernetes, OpenShift).
• CI/CD: Extensive knowledge and practical experience designing and implementing end‑to‑end CI/CD pipelines (e.g. Jenkins, GitLab CI, GitHub Actions) and configuring Git runners for private cloud deployments.
• Scripting: Proficiency in scripting languages (e.g. Python, Bash, PowerShell) for developing automation glue logic and utility scripts.
• Analytical Skills: Excellent ability to analyse complex technical problems, map out process flows, and propose clear, actionable solutions.
• Communication: Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, capable of presenting technical concepts to both technical and non‑technical audiences.