Specialist – DevOps

Overview of Role:
The Specialist – DevOps works on the DevOps practice team and is responsible for designing, building, and continuously improving the DevOps tooling, CI/CD pipelines, and automation capabilities that enable secure, reliable, and scalable software delivery across WestJet Technology.
This role delivers reusable platforms and standards (e.g., source control and build patterns, pipeline templates, artifact management, quality gates, container tooling) and partners with product and platform teams to reduce delivery friction, improve developer experience, and increase deployment quality and predictability.
Working closely with Architecture, Security, Quality Management, Project Management, and Operations, the Specialist helps advance DevOps maturity through hands-on engineering, documentation, knowledge sharing, and data-driven continuous improvement.
Key deliverables / responsibilities include:
Hands-on engineering ownership of DevOps platforms (tooling, CI/CD, automation, AKS).
Deliver reusable platforms and standards, improving the delivery experience.
Promote a culture of automation, continuous improvement, and engineering excellence.
Influence cross-functional leaders to adopt DevOps practices and modern delivery models.
Serve as an enterprise subject matter expert for DevOps maturity.
DevOps Strategy and Platforms
Work with team to evolve the enterprise DevOps vision, standards, and best practices.
Establish and maintain governance frameworks for branching and release, tooling standardization, and compliance.
Administration and lifecycle management of key delivery platforms including: Atlassian Suite, Azure DevOps, GitHub, Artifactory, SonarQube, Docker, etc.
Own and maintain reusable pipelines to ensure CI/CD standardization across product teams.
Own and maintain shared libraries to enable product teams to focus on building business value.
Support product teams in migrating containerized workloads onto WestJet’s Kubernetes platform.
Drive operational health and stability by building and maintaining WestJet’s Kubernetes platform.
Identify and lead DevOps capability upgrades, automation opportunities, and modernization initiatives.
Environment Management
Environment lifecycle: creation, readiness, connectivity checks, and decommissioning.
Build a self-serve environment management platform.
Experience and qualifications:
Postgraduate qualifications in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, Information Security, or Business Administration, and 7+ years of experience preferred, or an equivalent combination of training and experience.
Demonstrated leadership experience, including mentorship and technical guidance to multidisciplinary teams.
Proven ability to lead governance, standardization, and enterprise-scale tooling adoption.
Expert problem-solving abilities and advanced interpersonal and communication skills, including strong influencing capabilities.
Hands-on experience with complex release processes and environment landscapes.
Excellent executive communication and stakeholder management capabilities.
Demonstrable experience with program, project, and Agile methodologies and their application to successful technical delivery.