Position Title: Automation Engineer

About the Job 

The Automation Engineer builds the automation that removes manual, repetitive work from the running of enterprise infrastructure and platform services. This is a hands-on engineering role focused on operational automation: provisioning, configuration, patching, routine operational tasks, and automated remediation.

Working within an established automation practice and alongside senior engineers, the Automation Engineer takes defined automation requirements and delivers reliable, well-tested, reusable automation. The measure of the work is straightforward: fewer manual steps, fewer tickets, and fewer repeat interventions by human operators.

The role complements the DevOps Platform Engineer, who builds the CI/CD and developer tooling platform. This role concentrates on automating infrastructure and operational activity across Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, and the on-premise estate.

What you will be doing:

Infrastructure and Operations Automation

• Build and maintain automation that provisions, configures, and decommissions infrastructure across cloud and on-premises environments.
• Automate routine operational tasks including patching, certificate renewal, backup verification, log rotation, account administration, and service restarts.
• Convert manual runbooks into tested, repeatable, parameterized automation.
• Reduce ticket-based provisioning by delivering self-service automation that colleagues can run safely themselves.

Configuration Management and Infrastructure as Code

• Develop and maintain Ansible playbooks, roles, and collections, executed through Ansible Automation Platform.
• Build and maintain Terraform configurations and modules for repeatable infrastructure provisioning.
• Keep environments consistent by detecting and correcting configuration drift.

Event-Driven and Self-Healing Operations

• Build event-driven automation that responds to monitoring alerts and platform events without human intervention.
• Implement auto-remediation for known, well-understood failure conditions using Event-Driven Ansible and equivalent tooling.
• Work with observability data from Datadog, Dynatrace, Prometheus, Grafana, and Splunk to identify candidates for automation.

Technical Craft and Engineering Practices

• Write clear, tested, peer-reviewed automation code in Python, PowerShell, and Bash.
• Manage all automation in Git, following the team's branching, review, and release practices.
• Handle credentials and secrets through approved services such as HashiCorp Vault and CyberArk, never in code or configuration.
• Use AI-assisted engineering tools such as GitHub Copilot and Claude Code to accelerate development, testing, and documentation, applying appropriate review and technical judgement.
• Document what each automation does, how to run it, and how it fails.

Collaboration and Ways of Working

• Work within an agile team with a shared backlog and defined customers.
• Take direction and technical guidance from senior engineers, and actively seek feedback and code review.
• Partner with infrastructure, cloud, and operations colleagues to understand the manual work worth automating.
• Contribute to incident response and follow-up actions where automation forms part of the remedy.

What You Will be doing:

Required

• Demonstrated capability in infrastructure, operations, or automation engineering, typically gained across two to four years of professional experience.
• Practical scripting ability in at least one of Python, PowerShell, or Bash.
• Hands-on experience with configuration management or automation tooling, ideally Ansible.
• Working knowledge of Linux or Windows server administration.
• Familiarity with at least one major public cloud, such as Azure or AWS.
• Experience using Git for version control.
• A methodical approach to troubleshooting and a genuine dislike of repetitive manual work.
• Clear written and verbal communication in English.

Preferred

• Experience with Terraform or another Infrastructure as Code tool.
• Experience with Ansible Automation Platform, AWX, or Event-Driven Ansible.
• Exposure to containers, Kubernetes, or CI/CD pipelines.
• Exposure to observability tooling such as Datadog, Dynatrace, Prometheus, Grafana, or Splunk.
• Experience working within a validated, GxP, or otherwise regulated environment, including awareness of data-protection obligations such as GDPR.
• Certifications such as Red Hat Certified Specialist in Ansible Automation, HashiCorp Terraform Associate, or AWS or Azure associate level.
• A bachelor's degree in computer science, engineering, information technology, or a related discipline.

Core Competencies

• Automation-first mindset and low tolerance for repetitive work
• Attention to detail and care with production systems
• Curiosity and willingness to ask questions
• Openness to feedback and coaching
• Reliability and follow-through on commitments
• Strong appetite for continuous learning

Measures of Success

• Volume of manual operational tasks automated
• Reduced ticket volume for routine and repeatable requests
• Increased use of self-service automation by colleagues
• Reduced configuration drift and manual configuration changes
• Reduced repeat incidents through automated remediation
• Steady growth in technical depth and delivery independence

Pursue progress, discover extraordinary

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At Sanofi, we provide equal opportunities to all regardless of race, colour, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, ability or gender identity.

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