Cost Optimization Jobs in Washington (NOW HIRING)

Lead AWS CloudOps / FinOps Engineer (Cost Optimization)

? Location: Remote (U.S.) | Hybrid option available in Reston, VA for local candidates ? Contract Length: 9 Months (Strong possibility of extension based on project needs) ? Employment Type: Contract

About the Opportunity

We are seeking an experienced Lead AWS CloudOps / FinOps Engineer to join a major cloud transformation initiative supporting enterprise-scale AWS environments. This is a high-impact leadership role focused on cloud financial management, cost optimization, operational excellence, automation, and cloud engineering best practices.

You will partner with Platform Engineering, Finance, Product, Architecture, and Application teams to drive cloud cost transparency, governance, forecasting, reporting, and optimization while ensuring scalable, secure, and resilient AWS infrastructure.

This role is ideal for a hands-on cloud engineering leader who enjoys combining deep AWS expertise with FinOps strategy to deliver measurable business value.

What You'll Do

AWS Cloud Operations & Engineering

• Design, implement, and support enterprise AWS cloud solutions and operational frameworks.
• Manage and optimize AWS services including EC2, EKS, S3, Lambda, IAM, VPC, CloudWatch, CloudTrail, ELB, Direct Connect, and related services.
• Lead infrastructure automation initiatives using Terraform, Ansible, Python, CloudFormation, or similar technologies.
• Support system administration, patching, upgrades, disaster recovery planning, and capacity management.
• Drive reliability, scalability, security, and operational efficiency across cloud environments.

FinOps & Cost Optimization

• Build and maintain cloud cost reporting, dashboards, forecasting models, and executive summaries.
• Analyze cloud spending trends, usage patterns, budget variances, and optimization opportunities.
• Identify and eliminate waste, including:
  • Idle resources
  • Oversized instances
  • Orphaned storage
  • Unattached IPs
  • Unused commitments
  • Inefficient storage tiers
• Implement and support tagging standards, allocation models, cost accountability, and governance policies.
• Partner with engineering teams to improve cost visibility and financial accountability.
• Support showback/chargeback models across business units.
• Utilize tools such as:
  • AWS Cost Explorer
  • Cost & Usage Reports (CUR)
  • AWS Budgets
  • Cost Anomaly Detection
  • Apptio Cloudability (or equivalent)

Leadership & Transformation

• Lead cloud modernization and transformation initiatives.
• Mentor engineers and promote engineering excellence across teams.
• Communicate architectural decisions, trade-offs, and cloud financial insights to both technical and business stakeholders.
• Champion Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles and cloud-native best practices.
• Provide strategic recommendations balancing cost, performance, reliability, and scalability.

Required Qualifications

Experience

• 10+ years of overall IT experience.
• 5+ years of hands-on AWS cloud engineering experience.
• 2+ years of FinOps, cloud cost optimization, or cloud financial management experience.
• Proven experience leading cloud transformation and modernization initiatives.
• Strong systems engineering, operations, and cloud infrastructure background.

Technical Skills

• Deep expertise with AWS services, including:
  • EC2
  • S3
  • EBS/EFS
  • IAM
  • Lambda
  • VPC
  • CloudWatch
  • CloudTrail
  • EKS
  • Networking and Direct Connect
• Strong Infrastructure-as-Code experience using:
  • Terraform
  • AWS CloudFormation
  • Ansible
• Strong scripting/programming skills in Python.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines and DevOps practices.
• Knowledge of Git, Jenkins, Bitbucket, Artifactory, Nexus, ArgoCD, Jira, Maven, Bamboo, or similar tools.
• Strong reporting and analytics experience using:
  • Power BI
  • Excel
  • SQL
  • AWS QuickSight

FinOps Expertise

• Experience with Apptio Cloudability or similar cloud cost management platforms.
• Strong understanding of:
  • Cloud cost allocation
  • Chargeback/showback models
  • Budget forecasting
  • Cost governance
  • Cost anomaly detection
  • Resource rightsizing
  • Savings Plans
  • Reserved Instances
  • Autoscaling
  • Storage lifecycle optimization
• Knowledge of FinOps best practices and FOCUS (FinOps Open Cost & Usage Specification) preferred.

Education

• Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field.
• Additional relevant experience may be considered in lieu of degree requirements.

Preferred Qualifications

• AWS Certified Solutions Architect, AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, or other AWS certifications.
• FinOps Certified Practitioner certification.
• Experience with Kubernetes, Docker, EKS, ECS, or containerized environments.
• Exposure to AI/ML solutions and AWS-native AI services.
• Experience working in Agile/Scrum environments.
• Knowledge of enterprise observability tools such as Datadog, New Relic, AppDynamics, Jaeger, or similar platforms.

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