Senior Azure Engineer

Role Description

We are seeking an experienced and highly motivated Senior Azure Engineer to lead the design, implementation, and evolution of our enterprise cloud platform. This role requires a senior cloud engineer who combines deep technical expertise with strategic thinking to build highly resilient, scalable, secure, and automated Azure solutions.

As a Senior Azure Engineer, you will serve as a senior technical authority for Azure architecture, cloud operations, platform engineering, automation, security, and governance. You will partner closely with Infrastructure, Security, Application Development, DevOps, Enterprise Architecture, and Business Technology teams to drive cloud adoption, establish engineering standards, and enable delivery of critical business services.

This role requires both strategic leadership and hands-on expertise, with responsibility for defining cloud architecture patterns, infrastructure automation strategies, operational excellence practices, and security frameworks across the enterprise. Members of this team participate in major incident escalation support and provide technical leadership during critical production events.

Responsibilities

• Cloud Architecture & Engineering
  • Lead the design and implementation of enterprise-scale Azure cloud architectures that are secure, scalable, resilient, and cost-efficient.
  • Define and govern Azure landing zones, subscription strategy, resource organization, and enterprise cloud standards.
  • Architect high-availability and disaster recovery solutions aligned with business continuity objectives and recovery requirements.
  • Develop multi-region, hybrid cloud, and cloud-native architectures supporting mission-critical workloads.
  • Serve as the technical escalation point for complex cloud infrastructure and platform challenges.
• Platform Engineering & Automation
  • Define and lead Infrastructure as Code (IaC) initiatives using Terraform, Bicep, and Azure-native automation tooling.
  • Develop self-service cloud capabilities that empower application and engineering teams.
  • Drive platform standardization through reusable modules, templates, and automation frameworks.
  • Establish engineering best practices for CI/CD pipelines, deployment automation, configuration management, and operational excellence.
  • Champion GitOps and Platform Engineering principles across the organization.
• Security & Governance
  • Partner with Security teams to establish secure-by-design cloud architectures.
  • Define Azure governance frameworks including policies, management groups, resource controls, tagging standards, and compliance controls.
  • Architect and implement enterprise security capabilities utilizing:
    • Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD)
    • Azure Key Vault
    • Azure Defender / Microsoft Defender for Cloud
    • Azure Sentinel
    • Privileged Identity Management (PIM)
    • Conditional Access
  • Conduct architecture reviews and threat modeling exercises to reduce risk and improve cloud security posture.
• Operations & Reliability
  • Define enterprise monitoring, observability, and operational support strategies using Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, Application Insights, and related tools.
  • Drive automation and operational maturity through Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) practices.
  • Establish service reliability objectives, performance metrics, and operational standards.
  • Lead root cause analysis efforts and drive remediation of recurring issues.
• Technical Leadership
  • Serve as a cloud subject matter expert and trusted advisor to technology leadership.
  • Mentor engineers and contribute to the growth of cloud engineering capabilities throughout the organization.
  • Lead architecture reviews, technology evaluations, and cloud modernization initiatives.
  • Influence roadmaps, technology decisions, standards, and best practices across teams.
  • Communicate complex technical concepts effectively to both technical and executive stakeholders.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree and 4 years of experience in cloud engineering OR High School Diploma or GED and 8 years of experience in cloud engineering.
• Preferred Qualifications:
  • 8+ years of relevant experience or MS with 5+ years of relevant experience.
  • Experience with multiple cloud platforms is a big plus.
  • 10+ years of progressive infrastructure, cloud engineering, or platform engineering experience.
  • 7+ years of hands-on Azure engineering and architecture experience.
  • Proven experience leading enterprise cloud transformation initiatives.
  • Demonstrated success designing and operating large-scale cloud platforms supporting critical business applications.
  • Deep understanding of cloud architecture frameworks, governance, security, and operational excellence.
  • Experience mentoring engineers and providing technical leadership across organizations.
  • Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to present technical concepts to executive leadership.

Preferred Certifications

• Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert
• Microsoft Certified: Azure DevOps Engineer Expert
• Microsoft Certified: Cybersecurity Architect Expert
• Microsoft Certified: Azure Network Engineer Associate
• Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA)
• Terraform Associate Certification

Benefits

Benefits are an integral part of total rewards and First Citizens Bank is committed to providing a competitive, thoughtfully designed and quality benefits program to meet the needs of our associates. More information can be found at First Citizens Bank Benefits .