Founding DevOps Engineer/Leader

About the Role

Our client is seeking a hands-on DevOps Leader to drive operations and systems while contributing directly as a power IC (individual contributor). This is a founding-level role that focuses on building, scaling, and maintaining cloud infrastructure while ensuring reliability, scalability, and security across our systems.

You’ll be the first DevOps hire, responsible for owning the infrastructure (GCP, Postgres, OpenAI integrations, etc.) and setting the foundation for world-class operations. The right candidate thrives in fast-moving environments, takes ownership, and ships quickly without sacrificing quality.

Key Responsibilities

• Serve as the lead for operations and systems, owning all aspects of infrastructure.
• Build, scale, and support our cloud environment (GCP, Postgres, OpenAI integrations).
• Architect and manage CI/CD pipelines (Cloud Build, GitHub Actions, or similar).
• Ensure operational excellence: monitoring, troubleshooting, and resolving outages (including off-hours support if needed).
• Implement containerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and automated testing for cloud deployments.
• Drive adoption of observability practices (Cloud Monitoring, Logging, Alerting).
• Implement advanced security and compliance frameworks (SOC2, HIPAA, ISO).
• Optimize databases for scalability, performance, and reliability.
• Ship fast while balancing long-term reliability and quality.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of professional engineering experience (Staff/Principal level).
• Currently in an IC role and actively engaged in hands-on work (not management-only).
• Strong DevOps/Infrastructure background with Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
• Experience with containerization and orchestration (Docker, GKE).
• Advanced skills in Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, Pulumi, Deployment Manager).
• Hands-on experience supporting cloud-based applications and databases (OpenAI, GCP, Postgres).
• Familiarity with distributed systems and CI/CD practices.
• Available to work onsite in Ottawa (150 Isabella) — relocation considered for exceptional candidates.

Bonus Skills

• Full stack development experience (backend-leaning preferred):
• Proficiency in TypeScript, Node.js, React/Next.js.
• Experience building APIs and backend services.
• Experience with AI/LLM development:
• Prompt engineering, Chain of Thought, Multi-Agent systems.
• LLM orchestration tools (LangGraph, CrewAI, etc.).
• Production experience with RAG, evals, and LLM-based applications.
• Broader dev experience (mobile apps, Chrome extensions, telephony APIs).
• Experience with additional GCP services like Cloud Run, BigQuery, CloudSQL.
• Startup or founder experience.
• Notable side projects or passion work.

Who You Are

• A force of nature — a builder who ships fast and gets things done.
• Obsessed with quality, scalability, and impact.
• A true power IC who thrives in high-growth, startup environments.
• Excited to set the foundation for infrastructure and engineering culture at a company built to scale.