Development Operations Engineer

This position in the Data & Analytics Department is responsible for designing, implementing, and managing the continuous integration and deployment infrastructure, monitoring solutions, and cloud-based architecture that supports development and production systems. The Development Operations Engineer (DevOps Engineer) will play a critical role in improving the speed, quality, and cost-effectiveness of our infrastructure and cloud services, with a particular emphasis on Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Working under the general direction of the Assistant Director, Development and Operations, the DevOps Engineer will partner with developers and analysts to enhance system reliability, security, and scalability, and lead initiatives to identify cost savings and automation opportunities across our cloud-based environment. Experience in the labor movement or with progressive political organizations is strongly preferred.

DUTIES:

• Architect, deploy, and maintain secure and scalable infrastructure solutions, primarily in AWS.
• Monitor cloud usage and implement strategies to reduce cost while maintaining performance and scalability.
• Automate provisioning, configuration, deployment, monitoring, and security using Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools such as Terraform, Pulumi, or AWS CloudFormation.
• Maintain and improve CI/CD pipelines using tools like GitHub Actions.
• Collaborate with software developers and analysts to troubleshoot and resolve issues across environments.
• Develop and manage observability tools for monitoring and logging using AWS-native services such as CloudWatch and CloudTrail.
• Implement and enforce security best practices, policies, and access controls across infrastructure.
• Support containerized or serverless application deployment in a cloud environment.
• Participate in disaster recovery planning, backups, and business continuity strategies.
• Create and maintain technical documentation for architecture, configuration, and operational procedures.
• Provide mentorship and guidance to other developers and technical staff on DevOps and cloud practices.
• Keep current on emerging tools, technologies, and best practices in cloud architecture and DevOps, and make recommendations for improvement.
• Must be able to independently perform DevOps related tasks and activities, as well as work jointly with other team members to deliver complex changes.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

REQUIREMENTS:

Education and Experience:

Graduation from an accredited four-year college or university with a degree in Computer Science, Information Systems or a related field; a minimum of five (5) years of relevant experience in DevOps, cloud operations, or infrastructure engineering, or any equivalent combination of education and experience that provides the following knowledge, skills, and abilities:

Skills:

• AWS Certified Solutions Architect or equivalent AWS certification strongly preferred.
• Strong experience with Amazon Web Services, including cost optimization, networking, IAM, and core compute/storage services.
• Proficiency in infrastructure automation and provisioning tools (e.g. Pulumi, Serverless).
• Experience managing CI/CD pipelines (e.g., GitHub Actions, CircleCI).
• Hands-on experience with containerization and orchestration (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes).
• Proficiency in Git for version control, code branching strategies, and code collaboration.
• Strong understanding of ETL/ELT workflows and distributed data processing frameworks.
• Strong scripting skills in Python, Bash, or similar languages.
• Experience with logging and monitoring solutions (e.g., CloudWatch, Datadog, ELK, Grafana).
• Familiarity with security best practices in cloud environments (e.g., role-based access, encryption, auditing).
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills.
• Ability to document and present complex technical solutions to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Experience working with labor unions, nonprofit advocacy organizations, or progressive political campaigns is strongly preferred.

Travel and Work Hours:

• Extended work hours including weekends and travel may be required.
• Driver’s license is required.

AFSCME is an equal opportunity employer, and, as such, does not discriminate an employee or applicant on the basis of race, creed, color, age, sex, national origin, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, religious affiliation, disability, or any other classification protected from discrimination under applicable law.