Senior Cloud Engineer

Syms Strategic Group, LLC (SSG)•Virginia Beach, VA

2d•$109,623 - $126,790•Remote

About The Position

Syms Strategic Group (SSG) is seeking a Senior Cloud Engineer to support the Department of Veterans Affairs. This is a full-time, 100% U.S.-based remote position supporting VA Enterprise Cloud (VAEC) Azure GovCloud environments. The role designs, deploys, operates, secures, and monitors cloud infrastructure, applications, and services, while supporting VA product lines and ensuring compliance with VA and federal requirements. Candidates must be U.S. citizens and must possess or qualify for a Public Trust (MBI). Candidates residing in California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, or Washington will not be considered. This is a W-2 position. The engineer will create cloud architecture and transition diagrams; develop and operate CI/CD automation; manage cloud permissions; establish monitoring and observability; provision and configure VAEC environments; provide cloud security documentation; and design cloud-hosted solutions while addressing cloud-readiness gaps. The position calls for extensive Azure infrastructure expertise, technical leadership, mentoring, and experience leading complex modernization, migration, and transformation initiatives. On-call support and participation in operational response activities may be required. The posting requires 20+ years of professional experience and a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Systems Engineering, Cloud Engineering, or a related technical discipline. Desired experience includes hands-on Edifecs expertise with X12 EDI transactions and advanced Azure certifications. The listed salary range is $109,623–$126,790.

Requirements

20+ years of professional experience.
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Systems Engineering, Cloud Engineering, or a related technical discipline.
U.S. citizenship is required.
Must possess or qualify for a Public Trust (MBI).
Proven track record designing, deploying, and managing Azure infrastructure and services.
Experience with large-scale, highly available, scalable cloud architecture.
Expertise in Azure services including Virtual Machines, Blob Storage, Azure SQL Database, Virtual Network (VNet), Functions, Microsoft Entra ID, Azure Resource Manager (ARM), Azure Monitor, and Azure DNS.
Experience with Azure security practices and services, including Microsoft Entra ID, Azure RBAC, DDoS Protection, and Web Application Firewall (WAF).
Proficiency with Azure networking components, including VNet Peering, ExpressRoute, VPN Gateway, Private Endpoints, and Azure Load Balancer.
Ability to design, deploy, and manage scalable, secure, and highly available Azure cloud infrastructures.
Experience establishing and governing multi-subscription Azure environments using Management Groups, Azure Policy, and Azure Landing Zones.
Knowledge of cloud cost management, FinOps, budgeting, tagging strategies, and resource optimization using Azure Cost Management.
Proficiency in scripting languages such as Python, PowerShell, Bash, or JavaScript/NodeJS.
Experience with Infrastructure as Code tools and methods, including ARM Templates, Ansible, and GitOps.
Proficiency with monitoring, logging, and observability tools including Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, Application Insights, Azure Activity Log, and third-party tools such as Prometheus, Grafana, and New Relic.
Experience optimizing Azure performance, availability, and resiliency.
Understanding of Azure security best practices and compliance frameworks, including HIPAA, FedRAMP, NIST, GDPR, and PCI DSS.
Experience implementing encryption, key management, secrets management, and identity solutions using Azure Key Vault, customer-managed keys, and Microsoft Entra ID.
Knowledge of Azure database services including Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Managed Instance, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Database for PostgreSQL, and Azure Database for MySQL.
Experience with database performance tuning, backup and recovery, high availability, and disaster recovery strategies.
Familiarity with CI/CD tools and practices including Azure DevOps Pipelines, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, and GitLab CI.
Experience with containerization and orchestration technologies such as Docker, Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Container Apps, and Kubernetes.
Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, including ability to explain technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
Ability to prioritize tasks, manage competing priorities, and meet deadlines.
Strong attention to detail in support of system stability, security, operational excellence, and data integrity.
Ability to mentor engineers and provide technical leadership and guidance.
Experience leading complex cloud initiatives and collaborating with cross-functional teams.
Willingness to provide on-call support and participate in operational response activities when required.
Strong documentation skills.
Ability to manage and contribute to multiple projects simultaneously while delivering high-quality work.
Commitment to staying current with Azure technologies, cloud-native architectures, tools, and industry best practices.
Applicants must ensure answers to mandatory screening questions are supported by their resume; inconsistent applications will not be considered.
Applicants must provide a link to their LinkedIn profile as part of screening.
Candidates must be U.S.-based; applicants from California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, or Washington will not be considered.

Nice To Haves

Deep hands-on Edifecs experience with Electronic Data Interchange X12 transaction standards, including medical claims transactions 837, 834, 835, and 277; 270/271 and 278 transactions; and 999 transactions.
Experience with Edifecs.
Microsoft Certified: DevOps Engineer Expert certification.
Azure Administrator Associate certification.
Azure Security Engineer Associate certification.

Responsibilities

Create data-flow, cloud, transition, and high-level architecture diagrams for cloud infrastructure, applications, and systems.
Design, develop, deploy, and operate automation for continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD).
Manage and control permissions for cloud applications, storage, and services.
Design, implement, and manage monitoring capabilities for cloud architecture and hosted systems and applications, ensuring performance and compliance with VA and federal policies.
Provide customer-focused support to product lines and services, including setup, configuration, and provisioning of VA Enterprise Cloud (VAEC) environments.
Support systems and applications in VAEC Azure GovCloud environments, ensuring compliance with Veterans Independence Program (VIP) development, release, and documentation requirements.
Apply DevOps practices and CI/CD tools and methodologies.
Provide cloud security provider documentation.
Design VAEC and other cloud-hosted solutions and address cloud-readiness gaps.
Lead and contribute to cloud modernization, migration, and transformation initiatives in collaboration with cross-functional teams.
Mentor engineers and provide technical leadership and guidance.
Support architecture governance and contribute to multiple projects while meeting deadlines and quality expectations.
Provide on-call and emergency operational support when required.
Create and maintain documentation for architecture, operational procedures, security controls, system configurations, processes, and procedures.
Troubleshoot complex cloud issues and optimize the performance, availability, resiliency, security, and integrity of Azure resources and services.