Freelance Devops Engineer Remote Jobs in Dallas, TX

ServiceLink is seeking a hands-on DevOps Engineer who owns our software delivery infrastructure from code commit to production. Our platform runs on Microsoft Azure and our engineering teams work daily inside GitHub and Azure DevOps.  This role keeps that entire delivery ecosystem healthy, scalable, and moving fast. You will be the connection between development teams and the cloud platform they depend on. That means owning CI/CD pipelines, Azure infrastructure, developer tooling, and the automation that reduces friction at every step of the software delivery lifecycle. We also have an active project running in AWS, and you will support that workload as part of the broader portfolio. Success here looks like developers who ship with confidence, pipelines that enforce quality without slowing teams down, and infrastructure that is repeatable, observable, and never a surprise.

This is a strong opportunity for an experienced security professional ready to take greater ownership of enterprise-scale cloud security, shape process and tooling decisions, and grow toward architecture and technical leadership roles.

ServiceLink is modernizing the mortgage services industry through AI-accelerated engineering, intelligent automation, and next-generation software delivery practices. We empower the nation's top lenders and financial institutions with advanced technology, data-driven insights, and high-velocity product development models. Innovation isn't optional here - it's the expectation.

This is a hybrid role, and will be required to work in-office at our Plano, TX office at least 3 days per week.  Candidates must be located within reasonable commuting distance of Plano, TX and be willing to work in-office on a regular basis.

Applicants must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis and must not require sponsorship for employment visa status now or in the future.

A DAY IN THE LIFE

In this role, you will...

• 60% hands-on engineering: build and maintain CI/CD pipelines, provision and manage Azure infrastructure, automate operational toil
• 25% technical leadership: architecture decisions, IaC standards, cross-team enablement, and platform roadmap input
• 15% enablement and communication: documentation, developer onboarding, security and compliance evidence, leadership reporting
• Own the following outcomes:
• GitHub and Azure DevOps pipelines are the consistent, trusted delivery mechanism across all engineering teams
• Azure infrastructure is fully managed through Infrastructure as Code - repeatable, auditable, and drift-free
• Developers self-serve deployments and environment provisioning without manual DevOps intervention
• Security and quality controls are embedded in every pipeline with clear ownership and measurable coverage
• Cloud spend is visible and governed, with cost trends reported and acted on regularly
• Deployment frequency and lead time improve measurably quarter over quarter

FIRST 90 DAYS (CONCRETE DELIVERABLES)

• Audit existing GitHub and Azure DevOps pipelines and publish a standardization and improvement roadmap
• Deliver reusable pipeline templates (at least one application pipeline, one infrastructure pipeline) adopted by two or more teams
• Complete an Azure infrastructure IaC coverage assessment with a remediation plan for any unmanaged or manually provisioned resources
• Stand up baseline pipeline security and quality gates across all active repositories and ADO projects
• Publish an initial cloud cost baseline report with right-sizing and governance recommendations for Azure and the AWS project

DETAILED JOB DUTIES

CI/CD & Developer Tooling

• Design, build, and maintain CI/CD pipelines across GitHub Actions and Azure DevOps - covering build, test, security scanning, and deployment stages
• Standardize pipeline patterns across teams through reusable templates, shared task libraries, and documented branching and release workflows
• Govern the GitHub organization and Azure DevOps projects: access control, branch policies, code review requirements, and audit logging
• Integrate security and quality gates into pipelines - static analysis, secret scanning, dependency checks, and container scanning - without adding unnecessary friction
• Manage artifact and container registries as integrated components of the delivery pipeline
• Own the developer experience around CI/CD: onboarding new teams, troubleshooting pipeline failures, and reducing mean time to delivery

Azure Infrastructure & Platform

• Provision and manage production Azure infrastructure using Infrastructure as Code: compute, networking, containers, databases, storage, and identity
• Operate Azure Kubernetes Service and container workloads including deployment patterns, scaling, and upgrade management
• Manage Azure identity and access: Entra ID, managed identities, Key Vault, RBAC, and least-privilege service-to-service patterns
• Design and maintain Azure networking fundamentals: VNets, NSGs, Private Endpoints, and Application Gateway
• Administer and tune Azure platform services including App Services, Azure Functions, Azure SQL, and Cosmos DB as needed by product teams
• Own cloud cost visibility: tagging governance, right-sizing, reserved capacity planning, and monthly FinOps reporting

AWS (Active Project Support)

• Support and maintain infrastructure for an ongoing AWS-hosted project, applying the same IaC and pipeline standards used in Azure
• Manage core AWS services (compute, networking, storage, IAM) as required by the project scope
• Ensure consistency in security posture, observability, and deployment practices between the AWS project and the Azure primary environment

Infrastructure as Code & Automation

• Own the IaC codebase: module structure, remote state management, automated plan and apply workflows, and policy-as-code enforcement
• Build automation that eliminates manual operational work - environment provisioning, resource lifecycle management, and routine runbooks
• Enforce infrastructure quality standards: security policy scanning, drift detection, and peer review processes for all infrastructure changes

Observability & Reliability

• Build and maintain observability coverage across Azure and AWS environments: metrics, logging, alerting, and dashboards
• Own alerting strategy and on-call runbooks; participate in incident response and post-incident reviews
• Partner with engineering and SRE teams on reliability improvements, deployment safety, and change management practices

Required

• 5+ years in DevOps, platform engineering, or cloud infrastructure engineering with hands-on delivery ownership in production
• Strong working knowledge of CI/CD design and delivery practices (build, test, deploy stages, environment promotion, release strategies) and how to prioritize pipeline improvements by engineering impact
• Hands-on experience building and maintaining pipelines across multiple platforms (GitHub Actions and Azure DevOps) at scale, including reusable workflows and shared templates
• Solid understanding of cloud identity and access concepts: Entra ID, managed identities, RBAC, service-to-service auth, and secrets management, including common misconfigurations
• Ability to read, review, and reason about code in at least one major backend language (.NET or Python preferred) to troubleshoot pipeline and integration issues
• Demonstrated experience with Infrastructure as Code and cloud environments (Azure preferred), including shaping deployment standards, policies, and security gates
• Experience operating container and Kubernetes workloads (AKS preferred), including cluster lifecycle, scaling, and troubleshooting to resolution
• Strong track record communicating platform decisions, trade-offs, and infrastructure risk to technical and executive audiences
• Experience mentoring junior engineers on DevOps and cloud-native practices
• Organized and detail-oriented, with experience managing infrastructure and reliability work across multiple teams and driving accountability for delivery

Preferred

• Experience operating and hardening containerized environments (AKS, Docker, Kubernetes network policy) at scale
• Experience leading Infrastructure as Code standardization initiatives using structured module and policy-as-code approaches (Terraform, Bicep, Checkov, OPA, or similar)
• Deep familiarity with managed identity and least-privilege patterns in Azure (Entra ID, Managed Identities)
• Certifications such as Azure Solutions Architect, Azure DevOps Engineer Expert, CKA/CKAD, HashiCorp Terraform Associate, or equivalent practical experience
• Experience partnering with or coordinating security, SRE, or incident response teams on cross-team initiatives
• Prior experience contributing to platform or DevOps strategy and roadmap planning