Cloud Systems Engineer

To Apply for this Job Click Here Always Connecting, Always Evolving. TECHEAD is seeking qualified applicants for the following Contract position – Cloud Systems Engineer / Richmond VA – (JOB-22775). If you are looking for a new opportunity and this position looks to be a fit, please apply to see the TECHEAD difference that has made us successful for 30+ years! You can find more about our team and values by checking us out at TECHEAD or on Glassdoor Job Details: Title: Cloud Systems Engineer Location: Richmond, VA Compensation: $50.00 – $52.00 /per Hour Work Type: Contract Work Location: Hybrid Job Description: 6 Month ContractContract to Hire We are seeking an experienced Cloud Systems Engineer to join a specialized infrastructure team supporting a mission-critical, high-throughput digital commerce and underwriting transaction platform for a global insurance services leader. Reporting directly to the Cloud Infrastructure Manager, you will serve as a key custodian of a large-scale, highly resilient enterprise cloud environment. This is a high-visibility, hands-on role where you will operate across the entire cloud footprint—ensuring maximum uptime, bulletproof security posture, end-to-end automation, and performance optimization for customer-facing applications processing millions of high-value transactions. Key Responsibilities Cloud Operations & Reliability Engineering Maintain, monitor, and optimize multi-region, production-grade cloud environments to sustain 99.99%+ availability for mission-critical e-commerce and transaction engines. Partner with engineering leadership to execute proactive capacity planning, performance tuning, and resource scaling aligned with traffic spikes and market demand. Implement, test, and document comprehensive backup strategies, failover workflows, and disaster recovery (DR) plans to guarantee minimal RTO and RPO. Automation & Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Build and maintain reproducible cloud resources using modern Infrastructure as Code frameworks (Terraform, CloudFormation, or Ansible). Collaborate with application teams to streamline deployment pipelines (CI/CD), automating deployment gates, configuration drift detection, and rollout verification. Security, Identity & Governance Enforce enterprise-grade security baselines in coordination with Information Security teams, implementing least-privilege access management (IAM), secret rotation, and role-based access control (RBAC). Maintain compliance readiness across industry standards (SOC 2, PCI-DSS, ISO 27001) by conducting automated vulnerability assessments, configuration hardening, and remediation. Apply network segmentation, zero-trust network configurations, firewall rules, and API gateway routing. Monitoring, Telemetry & Incident Management Build out actionable monitoring, distributed tracing, and centralized alerting systems (e.g., Datadog, Splunk, CloudWatch, Dynatrace) to pinpoint bottlenecks before they impact users. Participate in scheduled on-call rotation and root-cause analysis (RCA) for operational disruptions, ensuring comprehensive post-mortem documentation and remediation. Cross-Functional Collaboration & FinOps Serve as the infrastructure bridge between Software Engineering, IT Operations, Enterprise Architecture, and InfoSec. Monitor cloud spend, identify unused or over-provisioned infrastructure, and implement tagging structures and cost-saving policies (FinOps best practices). Required Qualifications Experience: 4+ years of dedicated hands-on experience designing, operating, and automating production infrastructure on AWS (or equivalent enterprise multi-cloud environments). Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Proven proficiency using Terraform, CloudFormation, or similar tools to manage modular, immutable infrastructure. Networking & Security: Deep practical understanding of cloud networking fundamentals (VPCs, Subnets, Transit Gateways, Direct Connect/VPN, NAT, WAF, DNS/Route 53) and zero-trust IAM implementations. Scripting & Automation: Strong scripting capability in at least one language (Python, Bash, or PowerShell) for operational automation and task orchestration. CI/CD & Containers: Experience supporting containerized workloads (Docker, ECS, or Kubernetes/EKS) and continuous deployment pipelines (GitLab CI, GitHub Actions, Jenkins). Observability: Practical experience instrumenting APM, log aggregation, and real-time metric dashboards (Datadog, Splunk, Prometheus/Grafana, or ELK). Clearance/Eligibility: Must be eligible to work in the United States without sponsorship (or state your preferred policy). Preferred Qualifications Formal certifications: AWS Certified Solutions Architect (Associate/Professional) or AWS Certified SysOps Administrator. Prior experience within heavily regulated sectors (Insurance, FinTech, Banking, or HealthTech). Familiarity with database operations (PostgreSQL, Aurora, DynamoDB) and caching solutions (Redis). On-Site & Conversion Details Location: Fully on-site in Richmond, VA (Monday through Friday). Duration: 3 to 6-month contract with a clear roadmap to permanent full-time conversion based on performance and platform milestone delivery. TECHEAD’s mission is to make our on-site associates successful by placing them in the right environment so they can grow and prosper. How we treat and respond to our clients and employees is a reflection of who we are and makes us stand out from the rest. Keeping our business focused on building and maintaining relationships with our employees and clients is the key to our success. We won’t strive for anything less. TECHEAD provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, amnesty, or status as a covered veteran in accordance with applicable federal, state and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment in every location in which the company has facilities. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including, but not limited to, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training. For more information on TECHEAD please visit the employer's site. No second parties will be accepted. To Apply for this Job Click Here