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Cabinet Office

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DevOps Engineer (AWS)

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Summary

DevOps Engineer in the Cabinet Office's Platform Engineering team: building, deploying and operating AWS-centric cloud platforms and DevOps tooling (with Azure skills developed), covering automation, Terraform IaC, CI/CD, monitoring and FinOps cost optimisation. Permanent Grade 7 role at £59,207, hybrid with at least 60% office attendance.

  • Job grade: Grade 7
  • Contract type: Permanent
  • Business area: CO - Digital
  • Type of role: Digital
  • Working pattern: Flexible working, Full-time
  • Number of jobs available: 1

Location

Existing CO staff can work in their original contractual work location.
Existing Civil Servants working in all other departments can work in London, Newcastle, Norwich, Bristol, Glasgow, Manchester and York.
External candidates can work in Newcastle, Bristol, Glasgow, Manchester only.

About the job

Job summary

The Cabinet Office is the corporate headquarters for the government, employing over 6,000 people in a variety of roles across the UK. In partnership with HM Treasury, we take the lead in certain critical policy areas and support the Prime Minister to ensure the effective running of government.

The Cabinet Office Digital directorate has a crucial role to play in modernising the Cabinet Office through digital transformation. The directorate has approximately 350 staff and is growing in order to meet the demands of the department, and to provide a wider and more mature range of digital, data, technology and security services.

As a member of the Platform Engineering team, you will be responsible for the development, deployment, and ongoing operation of organisational platforms and tools within the Cabinet Office. Your role will involve working closely with the technical product manager and architect to shape platform work and priorities and manage backlogs effectively.

You will operate within an Agile environment, taking a lead role in developing automation tools and ensuring best practices in cloud engineering across the organisation. Your expertise will guide standardisation efforts and promote continuous improvement within the team.

Additionally, you will contribute to Financial Operations (FinOps) activities by providing recommendations to optimise platform expenditure. You will collaborate with stakeholders to optimise their cloud workloads, ensuring efficient and cost-effective use of AWS resources.

The primary focus of this role will be AWS, but you will also develop your skills for Azure, allowing for a multi-functional approach to our platform management.

Job description

As a DevOps Engineer embedded in an Agile team, you’ll:

• Develop, deploy, document and maintain digital platforms, mainly Azure, GitHub, and DevOps tooling and processes.
• Monitor, manage and optimise platform infrastructure to ensure stability, scalability, and performance.
• Implement and promote best practices for cloud engineering, security, and compliance.
• Lead the automation of deployment, infrastructure provisioning, and operational processes.
• Support disaster recovery and business continuity planning for cloud platforms.
• Contribute to FinOps initiatives by analysing costs and recommending optimisation strategies.
• Collaborate with product managers and architects to define platform strategies and priorities.
• Participate in Agile ceremonies and contribute to sprint planning, stand-ups, and retrospectives.
• Stay up to date with industry trends, service developments, and best practices in the DevOps domain.
• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to junior team members.

Person specification

Essential criteria

We want to hear from you if you have:

• Extensive hands-on experience in managing AWS organisation and services like AWS Control Tower, Account Factory for Terraform, and identity management using IAM Identity Centre, Microsoft Entra ID and OKTA.
• Deep understanding of network services (VPC, ALB, NLB, NAT, NACL and Route 53) and security configurations (Security Groups, SCP and KMS),
• Practical experience with Infrastructure as Code (IaC) frameworks like Terraform and CloudFormation.
• Strong problem-solving skills and ability to troubleshoot complex cloud infrastructure issues and optimise system performance.
• Strong scripting and automation skills using tools such as AWS Lambda, Python, Bash, or PowerShell.
• Hands-on experience with containerisation technologies such as Docker and orchestration using AWS ECS and AWS EKS.
• Proven track record in designing, deploying, and managing cloud infrastructure at scale.
• Knowledge of CI/CD pipelines and experience with tools like AWS CodeBuild, CodePipeline, GitHub Actions and other.
• Experience implementing and managing monitoring, logging, and alerting systems using CloudWatch, CloudTrail, ELK, PagerDuty and other similar tools.
• Practical experience in optimisation of cost and resource utilisation within cloud platforms (FinOps).

Additional information:

Cabinet Office policy is that a minimum 60% of your working time should be spent at your principal workplace. For some roles, due to their nature and the business need, this may be up to 100%. Requirements to attend other locations for official business will also count towards this level of attendance.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

  • Changing and Improving
  • Communicating and Influencing
  • Working Together
  • Developing Self and Others

We only ask for evidence of these behaviours on your application form:

  • Changing and Improving
  • Communicating and Influencing

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

  • Systems design in context of availability and capacity management
  • Service integration, information security, monitoring and observability
  • Service support and user focus
  • Development process optimisation and prototyping

We only ask for evidence of these technical skills on your application form:

  • Systems design in context of availability and capacity management

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £59,207, Cabinet Office contributes £17,152 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).
  • Learning and development tailored to your role.
  • An environment with flexible working options.
  • A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity.
  • A Civil Service Pension which provides an attractive pension, benefits for dependants and employer contributions of 28.97%.
  • A minimum of 25 days of paid annual leave, increasing by one day per year up to a maximum of 30.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Experience and Technical skills.

Application process

As part of the application process, you will be asked to provide:

  • A CV (Job History and Qualification details)
  • A statement of suitability of no more than 500 words
  • Behaviour examples covering the following areas:
    • Changing and Improving
    • Communicating and Influencing
  • Technical skills examples covering the following areas:
    • Systems design in context of availability and capacity management

Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.

Please use your statement of suitability (in no more than 500 words) to explain how you consider your experience; professional skills and qualities provide evidence of your suitability for the role with reference to the essential experience criteria in the person specification section of the job advert. Please include how long you have been using these skills and experience

Should a large number of applications be received, an initial sift may be undertaken using the lead Behaviour, Changing and Improving.

Selection process

During the interview you will be assessed against a behaviours:

The behaviours that will be assessed at interview will be:

  • Changing and Improving
  • Working Together
  • Developing Self and Others

You will also be assessed on the following technical skills during the interview:

  • Systems design in context of availability and capacity management
  • Service integration, information security, monitoring and observability
  • Service support and user focus
  • Development process optimisation and prototyping

Expected timeline (subject to change)

Expected sift date – w/c 16/11/2026

Expected interview date/s – w/c 02/12/2026 and 08/12/2026

Your interview will either be conducted face to face or by video. You will be notified of the location if you are selected for interview.

Further Information

A reserve list may be held for a period of 12 months from which further appointments can be made.

Any move to Cabinet Office from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare; for further information visit the Childcare Choices website.

Please note that this role requires SC clearance, which would normally need 5 years UK residency in the past years. This is not an absolute requirement, but supplementary checks may be needed where individuals have not lived in the UK for that period. This may mean your security clearance (and therefore your appointment) will take longer or, in some cases, not be possible.

For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the Demystifying Vetting website.

If successful and transferring from another Government Department a criminal record check may be carried out.

In order to process applications without delay, we will be sending a Criminal Record Check to Disclosure and Barring Service/Disclosure Scotland on your behalf.

However, we recognise in exceptional circumstances some candidates will want to send their completed forms direct. If you will be doing this, please advise Government Recruitment Service of your intention by emailing Pre-EmploymentChecks.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk stating the job reference number in the subject heading.

For further information on the Disclosure Scotland confidential checking service telephone: the Disclosure Scotland Helpline on 0870 609 6006 and ask to speak to the operations manager in confidence, or email Info@disclosurescotland.co.uk

New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.

Applicants who are successful at interview will be, as part of pre-employment screening, subject to a check on the Internal Fraud Database (IFD). This check will provide information about employees who have been dismissed for fraud or dishonesty offences. This check also applies to employees who resign or otherwise leave before being dismissed for fraud or dishonesty had their employment continued. Any applicant’s details held on the IFD will be refused employment.

A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role within the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5-year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government.

This role is full time only. Applicants who wish to work an alternative pattern are welcome to apply however your preferred working pattern may not be available and you should discuss this with the vacancy holder before applying.

If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.

Reasonable Adjustment

If a person with disabilities is put at a substantial disadvantage compared to a non-disabled person, we have a duty to make reasonable changes to our processes.

If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should:

Contact Government Recruitment Service via cabinetofficerecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs.

Complete the ‘Assistance required’ section in the ‘Additional requirements’ page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if you’re deaf, a Language Service Professional.

Please note terms and conditions are attached. Please take time to read the document to determine how these may affect you.

Feedback



      Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

      Security

      Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) criminal record check.
      Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

      See our vetting charter (opens in a new window).
      People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

      Nationality requirements

      This job is broadly open to the following groups:

      • UK nationals
      • nationals of the Republic of Ireland
      • nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
      • nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
      • nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
      • individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
      • Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service
      Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

      Working for the Civil Service

      The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

      We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).
      The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.
      The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

      Diversity and Inclusion

      The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

      Apply and further information

      This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.
      The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).
      Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

      Contact point for applicants

      Job contact :
      • Name : CO Digital Recruitment Team
      • Email : codigitalrecruitment@cabinetoffice.gov.uk
      Recruitment team
      • Email : cabinetofficerecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

      Further information

      Appointment to the Civil Service is governed by the Civil Service Commission’s Recruitment Principles. If you feel that your application has not been treated in accordance with the Recruitment Principles, and wish to make a complaint, then in the first instance you should contact Government Recruitment Service by email at : cabinetofficerecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk
      If you are not satisfied with the response you receive, then you can contact the Civil Service Commission at info@csc.gov.uk. For further information on the Recruitment Principles and bringing a complaint to the Civil Service Commission, please visit their website at: https://civilservicecommission.independent.gov.uk/.

      Attachments

      Cabinet Office Employee Offer (2) Opens in new window (pdf, 302kB)
      Cabinet Office Terms and Conditions - External 2025-02-20 (2) Opens in new window (docx, 94kB)

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