At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead DevOps improvements and enhance the Customer Digital Platform's reliability.
- Company: Join Standard Life, a leader in retirement savings with a supportive culture.
- Benefits: Enjoy a competitive salary, generous leave, private medical cover, and flexible working options.
- Other info: Embrace a dynamic environment with opportunities for personal and professional growth.
- Why this job: Make a real impact on digital services while working with cutting-edge technology.
- Qualifications: Experience in DevOps, Azure, and strong problem-solving skills required.
The predicted salary is between 60000 - 80000 £ per year.
If you’re a proactive, self-starting engineer who enjoys getting things done and improving the reliability of live digital services, Standard Life could be the place for you. We’re looking for a Lead DevOps Engineer to join our Digital Engineering team.
This role is focused on making immediate, practical improvements across the Customer Digital Platform. You’ll strengthen our DevOps foundations across Azure API platform integration, cloud infrastructure, CI/CD automation, observability, deployment safety and operational readiness, working closely with internal squads, strategic partners and third parties.
Job Type: Permanent
Location: Birmingham, London, Telford, Edinburgh (Hybrid working)
Flexible working: All roles are open to part-time, job-share and other types of flexibility. We will discuss what is important to you and balancing this with business requirements during the recruitment process.
Closing Date: 23/09/26
Salary and benefits: £60,000-80,000 (dependant upon experience) plus an indicative bonus range of 16–32%, private medical cover, 38 days annual leave, excellent pension, 12x salary life assurance, career breaks, income protection, 3x volunteering days and much more.
Who are we? We’re Standard Life, a retirement specialist focused entirely on retirement savings and income. We champion the belief that everyone’s journey to and through retirement can be better, and for more than 200 years, we’ve been helping our customers plan and prepare for their financial futures.
Life today is increasingly complicated, uncertain and unpredictable. People move through different careers, face unexpected moments and navigate important choices. We offer our colleagues flexibility, trust and benefits that work for whatever life brings. In return we expect curiosity, connection, accountability and high standards. We make room for what matters - so you can bring your best, every day.
The role: As a Lead DevOps Engineer, you will be a hands-on contributor and technical lead focused on improving the engineering foundations of the Customer Digital Platform. You will work across internal squads and with strategic partners, third parties, service, architecture and security teams to improve Azure API platform change, cloud infrastructure, CI/CD pipelines, deployment safety, release readiness, monitoring, alerting and recovery capability.
Key accountabilities:
- Deliver immediate DevOps improvements across the Customer Digital Platform, with a focus on practical engineering outcomes.
- Improve Azure API platform integration, cloud infrastructure, environment support and route-to-live activity.
- Strengthen CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code, GitHub/GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps, Terraform and automated testing.
- Improve deployment safety, release readiness and operational readiness for customer-facing digital services.
- Apply SRE principles pragmatically to improve availability, recoverability, monitoring and incident learning.
- Strengthen monitoring, logging, tracing, alerting and service-health dashboards across digitally connected workloads.
- Reduce single points of failure and improve failover, degradation handling and recovery testing.
- Embed reliability, security, performance and operational-readiness expectations into engineering delivery.
- Support major incidents, post-incident reviews and root-cause analysis, ensuring improvement actions are owned and delivered.
- Use DORA, availability, recovery and operational metrics to identify risks and evidence progress.
- Enable practical AI adoption across the SDLC, including developer tooling, code quality, testing, documentation and delivery-flow improvements.
- Work with strategic partners, third parties and other suppliers to improve DevOps capability, technical escalation, service improvement and knowledge transfer.
- Coach engineers in modern engineering practices, automation and AI-enabled delivery where it improves quality and throughput.
What are we looking for?
- Significant experience as a DevOps Lead, Senior DevOps Engineer, Platform Engineer or hands-on technical lead.
- A proactive, self-starting approach with evidence of identifying issues, shaping solutions and delivering improvements without heavy direction.
- Strong practical Azure experience, including Azure DevOps, Azure API Management or comparable API platform capabilities.
- Hands-on expertise in Terraform, GitHub, GitHub Actions, CI/CD pipeline design, deployment automation and release support.
- Practical knowledge of incident management, problem management, root-cause analysis and operational readiness.
- Good awareness of Site Reliability Engineering principles, with the ability to apply them pragmatically to DevOps and platform improvement work.
- Experience improving observability through monitoring, logging, tracing, alerting, service-health dashboards and actionable telemetry.
- Experience improving resilience through failover, graceful degradation, recovery testing and practical reliability improvements.
- Understanding of deployment safety, release automation, progressive delivery, performance and reliability engineering techniques.
- Experience using or shaping AI-enabled engineering practices across the SDLC, such as AI-assisted coding, automated testing, code review, documentation and developer productivity improvements.
We want to hire the whole version of you. We are committed to ensuring that everyone feels accepted and welcome applicants from all backgrounds. If your experience looks different from what we’ve advertised and you believe that you can bring value to the role, we’d love to hear from you. If you require any adjustments to the recruitment process, please let us know so we can help you to be at your best. We’re reviewing applications as they come in, so apply early to avoid missing out.
Find out more about working at Standard Life.
Software Engineer Lead - Site Reliability in Telford employer: Phoenix Group
Standard Life is an exceptional employer, offering a dynamic work environment in London, Edinburgh, Telford, or Birmingham, with flexible working arrangements that prioritise your needs. With a competitive salary and comprehensive benefits package, including generous annual leave, private medical cover, and opportunities for career development, we foster a culture of curiosity and accountability, empowering you to thrive while making a meaningful impact in the retirement sector.
StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫
We think this is how you could land Software Engineer Lead - Site Reliability in Telford
✨Join Local Tech Meetups
Get out there and mingle with fellow developers by joining local tech meetups. It’s a fantastic way to meet people who might be working at Phoenix Group or know someone who does. Plus, you can pick up some trendy tech skills and trends while you're at it!
✨Contribute to Open Source Projects
Show off your coding chops by jumping into open-source projects. Not only does this give you practical experience, but it also gets you noticed in the dev community. You'll create a killer portfolio that speaks volumes about your skills to Phoenix Group.
✨Tap into Online Developer Communities
Don’t underestimate the power of online developer communities like GitHub, Stack Overflow, and even Reddit. Participate in discussions, share your projects, and build your visibility. We can often find opportunities through these channels that can lead to a full-time gig at companies like Phoenix Group.
✨Explore Job Boards Specifically for Tech Roles
Keep your eyes peeled on job boards that focus on tech roles. Sites like TechCareers or Stack Overflow Jobs can often have listings for companies like Phoenix Group that might not show up on broader job sites. Make it a habit to check these regularly, and don’t hesitate to apply directly through our website!
We think you need these skills to ace Software Engineer Lead - Site Reliability in Telford
Some tips for your application 🫡
Show off your coding skills:When applying for a software engineering role, it's super important to showcase your coding skills. Make sure your CV includes your tech stack, any relevant programming languages you’re comfortable with, and examples of projects you've worked on. If you have a GitHub profile, link it up! We love to see code in action.
Tailor your portfolio:For a full-time role, we’d expect to see some solid examples of your work in your portfolio. Make sure to include at least two or three projects that highlight your problem-solving skills and your ability to work with different technologies. Focus on the projects that are most relevant to the position at Phoenix Group.
Craft a killer cover letter:Your cover letter is your chance to stand out—make it personal! Explain why you want to work at Phoenix Group and how your skills align with the role. Show us your passion for software development. We dig enthusiastic candidates who understand the value of collaboration and continuous learning!
Be clear and concise:When it comes to writing your CV and cover letter, clarity is key. Avoid jargon that could confuse us and stick to simple, direct language. Highlight your achievements with quantifiable results where possible, and keep everything easy to read. A well-organised application goes a long way!
How to prepare for a job interview at Phoenix Group
✨Brush Up on Your Coding Skills
For a full-time software engineering role, it's crucial that we stay sharp with our coding abilities. Expect technical questions that might involve solving problems on the spot or discussing algorithms. Practise on platforms like LeetCode or HackerRank to get comfortable with the types of questions that often come up.
✨Know Your Tools and Frameworks
Make sure we’re well-acquainted with the tools and technologies listed in the job description. Familiarise ourselves with any specific frameworks or programming languages mentioned. If Phoenix Group uses React or Node.js, for instance, be ready to discuss how we’ve used them in previous projects or coursework.
✨Showcase Your Projects
Bring along a portfolio that highlights our best work. This could be code samples, GitHub repositories, or any side projects we’ve built. Make sure we can talk through our thought process for each project, especially the challenges we faced and how we solved them—this shows our problem-solving skills in action.
✨Prepare for Behavioural Questions
While technical skills are key, full-time positions also require cultural fit. Be ready to discuss our previous experiences and how we handle teamwork, conflict, and deadlines. Brush up on the STAR method—Situation, Task, Action, Result—to clearly articulate our past experiences when discussing how we've contributed to a team.
