Platform Engineer (we have office locations in Cambridge, Leeds & London)

Company Description

Genomics England partners with the NHS to provide whole genome sequencing diagnostics. We also equip researchers to find the causes of disease and develop new treatments - with patients and participants at the heart of it all.

Our mission is to continue refining, scaling, and evolving our ability to enable others to deliver genomic healthcare and conduct genomic research.

We are accelerating our impact and working with patients, doctors, scientists, government and industry to improve genomic testing, and help researchers access the health data and technology they need to make new medical discoveries and create mor e effective, targeted medicines for everybody.

Job Description

Are you passionate about automation, cloud technology, and solving complex engineering challenges? As a Platform Engineer at Genomics England you'll have the opportunity to design, build, and optimise innovative cloud infrastructure using AWS and the latest automation tools. You won't just maintain systems - you'll innovate, collaborate, and drive meaningful change.

In this role, you'll work in a high-impact environment, ensuring our platforms are scalable, secure, and efficient. From fine-tuning CI/CD pipelines to proactively automating solutions, your expertise will shape the future of our technology. We believe in empowering engineers, fostering an inclusive culture, and giving you the autonomy to make a real impact.

The Knowledge Management and Data Services squad is entering a period of experimentation and tech evaluation - so a very exciting time to get involved here!

Everyday responsibilities include:

• Collaborate with a supportive DevOps team to drive automation, efficiency, and continuous improvement
• Own and enhance cloud-based infrastructure on AWS, ensuring scalability, security, and reliability (including networking, Glue, and Lake Formation)
• Develop, maintain, and optimize CI/CD pipelines using Terraform, scripting, and GitLab CI/CD (experience with Jenkins and Ansible also valuable)
• Implement Infrastructure as Code (IaC) to automate deployments and reduce manual effort
• Build infrastructure to support automated testing and resilient platform operations
• Troubleshoot and debug platform issues, ensuring seamless operations and minimal downtime
• Influence engineering decisions in a collaborative and inclusive environment that values diverse perspectives

Skills and experience for success:

• Comfortable with AWS services, especially networking and AWS Glue (DataZone experience is a bonus but not expected)
• Strong knowledge of Terraform for infrastructure automation
• Proficiency in scripting and automating infrastructure processes (Python preferred)
• Hands-on experience with CI/CD pipelines and DevOps best practices
• Familiarity with dbt and Lake Formation is a bonus
• Experience setting up infrastructure to enable automated testing
• Experience collaborating in a DevOps or squad-based culture

Areas where you will shine (nice to haves):

• Experience with lean experimentation, technology assessment, and product engineering approaches
• Experience managing or leading initiatives beyond your squad, including following up with other tech stakeholders and platform engineers
• Evidence of strong ownership over your area and noticing when work is slipping in your squad
• Experience mentoring other developers and supporting them in owning and driving squad-level work

Qualifications

Qualifications are not mandatory, however AWS, Terraform, or Automation certifications are welcome and highly beneficial

Additional Information

Salary from: £71,500

Closing Date: Sunday 29th June at 23:00 (UK time)

Being an integral part of such a meaningful mission is extremely rewarding in itself, but in order to support our people, we're continually improving our benefits package. We pride ourselves on investing in our people and supporting them to achieve their career goals, as well as offering a benefits package including:

• Generous Leave: 30 days' holiday plus bank holidays, additional leave for long service, and the option to apply for up to 30 days of remote working abroad annually (approval required).
• Family-Friendly: Blended working arrangements, flexible working, enhanced maternity, paternity and shared parental leave benefits.
• Pension & Financial: Defined contribution pension (Genomics England double-matches up to 10%, however you can contribute more if you wish), Life Assurance (3x salary), and a Give As You Earn scheme.
• Learning & Development: Individual learning budgets, support for training and certifications, and reimbursement for one annual professional subscription (approval required).
• Recognition & Rewards: Employee recognition programme and referral scheme.
• Health & Wellbeing: Subsidised gym membership, a free Headspace account, and access to an Employee Assistance Programme, eye tests, flu jabs.

Equal opportunities and our commitment to a diverse and inclusive workplace

Genomics England is actively committed to providing and supporting an inclusive environment that promotes equity, diversity and inclusion best practice both within our community and in any other area where we have influence. We are proud of our diverse community where everyone can come to work and feel welcomed and treated with respect regardless of any disability, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, religion, sexual orientation, or social background.

Genomics England's policies of non-discrimination and equity and will be applied fairly to all people, regardless of age, disability, gender identity or reassignment, marital or civil partnership status, being pregnant or recently becoming a parent, race, religion or beliefs, sex or sexual orientation, length of service, whether full or part-time or employed under a permanent or a fixed-term contract or any other relevant factor.

Genomics England does not tolerate any form of discrimination, harassment, victimisation or bullying at work. Such behaviour is contrary to our virtues, undermines our mission and core values and diminishes the dignity, respect and integrity of all parties. Our People policies outline our commitment to inclusivity.

We aim to remove barriers in our recruitment processes and to be flexible with our interview processes. Should you require any adjustments that may help you to fully participate in the recruitment process, we encourage you to discuss this with us.

Blended working model

Genomics England operates a blended working model as we know our people appreciate the flexibility that hybrid working can bring. We expect most people to come into the office a minimum of 2 times each month. However, this will vary according to role and will be agreed with your team leader. There is no expectation that people will return to the office full time unless they want to, however, some of our roles require full time on site attendance e.g., lab teams, reception team.

Our teams and squads have, and will continue to reflect on what works best for them to work together successfully and have the freedom to design working patterns to suit, beyond the minimum. Our office locations are: Canary Wharf, Cambridge and Leeds.

Onboarding background checks

As part of our recruitment process, all successful candidates are subject to a Standard Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check. We therefore require applicants to disclose any previous offences at point of application, as some unspent convictions may mean we are unable to proceed with your application due to the nature of our work in healthcare.