Craig Hoad

Hertfordshire, United Kingdom • craighoad@hotmail.com

I am an experienced DevOps Engineer and a qualified AWS Cloud Architect with extensive experience with Microsoft Azure DevOps. I have also completed ISC2 CCSP, the industry's premier cloud security qualification and I am currently studying ISC2 CISSP, the world's premier cyber security qualification. I thrive in collaborative, creative and forward-thinking cultures.

Download a copy of my CV

Experience

Overview

Working primarily in AWS I have extensive experience and continuous deployment (CICD) across a wide range of AWS infrastructure with a focus on ETL and data driven workloads. I have worked with CodePipeline, CodeBuild, Jenkins and CodeDeploy at an advanced level and have carried out blue/green, canary and split-horizon type deployments.

I have utilised both Terraform and Cloudformation (IAC) to deploy infrastructure and ansible playbooks to customise instances. I have worked to reduce monthly costs through a variety of means including right-sizing and reserving instances, shutting down non-production environments and enabling auto-scaling.

Historically, I have also worked on Azure DevOps platform running static code analysis (SonarQube), behavioural testing (Gherkin) and eventual deployment of containerised (Docker) micro-services onto Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) .

Cloud Engineer @ Aztrazeneca

Apr 2020 - Present

British-Swedish multinational pharmaceutical and biotech company based in Cambridge

Recruited into SysOps team to maximise value for patients through the delivery of large-scale enterprise-level data-centric projects as part of the late science Digital Health team.

Working as part of multidisciplinary data science and cloud engineering teams
Deploying systems, applications and tooling for data science on cloud environments
Maintaining strict datalake compliance guardrails to safeguard sensitive data
Driving efficiency through automation and self service
Optimizing solutions for performance and scalability and cost effectiveness
Building, maintaining and operating CICD deployment pipelines.
Delivering data science ETL and analytical platforms across the data lake

Lead DevOps Engineer @ PayPoint

May 2019 - Apr 2020

UK’s largest multi-channel payments provider based in WGC, Hertfordshire

Recruited as DevOps lead to help shape DevOps function, train junior members and facilitate adoption of DevOps tooling and processes throughout the IT team and wider business.

Creating new DevOps function and centre of excellence
Continuous delivery (CI/CD) in Azure DevOps / Octopus
Building out automation scripts for Azure Kubernetes service
Continuous delivery via Azure DevOps pipelines to on-prem servers
DevOps process guardian, shaping people and process
Creating new infrastructure in line with architectural design

DevOps Engineer @ Affinity Water

February 2016 - May 2019

UK’s largest water-only supplier based in Hatfield, Hertfordshire

Transitioned from site reliability engineer to DevOps Engineer to leverage increasing AWS expertise as part of rapid cloud migration project.

Continuous integration CodeCommit / GitHub
Continuous deployment via CodePipeline, CodeBuild, Jenkins, Jira, Terraform
Developing serverless applications with ElasticSearch databases
Route 53 DNS routing/failover and traffic shaping, Blue/green / A/B deployments
Continuous monitoring and application telemetry using X-Ray/CloudWatch
Creating new infrastructure in line with project requirements

SRE @ Affinity Water

June 2015 - February 2016

UK’s largest water-only supplier based in Hatfield, Hertfordshire

Recruited as part of a team of 43 to ‘in-house’ the IT function from out-sourced partners as part of a multi-million-pound digital transformation project underpinned by AWS.

Ensuring 99.9% uptime across web portfolio
Monitoring customer experience and infrastructure against KPIs and service SLAs
Automating repeatable processes across infrastructure (Python, Selenium and PowerShell)
Deploying new code to production and non-production environments
Infrastructure monitoring, administration, patching and security hardening
DNS, SSL and DNS ownership and change management

Web Apps Specialist @ David Lloyd

August 2014 - June 2015

Europe’s leading fitness operator based in Hatfield, Hertfordshire

Recruited to provider team-leadership to the Web Applications support team and provide first-class support for David Lloyd’s business critical web applications.

Monitoring and managing David Lloyd’s international website portfolio
Load/Peak testing performance before high traffic generating advertising campaigns
Building new physical architecture to improve website performance
Improving availability though automation and continuous monitoring/improvement
Contributing to David Lloyd’s Single Customer View as part of new CRM strategy
Providing specialised knowledge of web and web services to the business

Web Apps Specialist @ McNicholas

May 2012 - August 2014

Construction and utilities company based in Elstree, Hertfordshire

Recruited to provide general application support for McNicholas’s large application estate with a particular focus on web applications and middleware web transactions.

Supporting web services/APIs (SOAP, XML, XSLT, Xpath, Xquery)
Coding client web portals in HTML5 and CSS3
Managing full development lifecycle of change requests from cradle to grave
Building complex SQL workflows for back-end HR system
Digital technology support, provisioning and problem solving
Management of third-party stakeholders, vendors and developers on projects

Education

CCSP - Certified Cloud Security Professional

Dec 2019 - no expiry

The Industry’s Premier Cloud Security Certification

"The CCSP shows you have the advanced technical skills and knowledge to design, manage and secure data, applications and infrastructure in the cloud using best practices, policies and procedures established by the cybersecurity experts at (ISC)²."

AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate

July 2019 - July 2021

Demonstrates competence to perform AWS solutions architecture

"The AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate examination is intended for individuals who perform a solutions architect role and have one or more years of hands-on experience designing available, cost-efficient, fault-tolerant, and scalable distributed systems on AWS."

BSc (Honours) Psychology - 2:1

May 2004 - May 2009

Solid grounding across biological, clinical, cognitive, health and social psychology

"As psychology is the study and science of human behaviour, it touches every aspect of our lives. This degree explores key questions around why we do the things we do and how we interact with others. You’ll explore how psychologists use research evidence to contribute to debates on forensic science, mental health, relationships, child development, employment and much more. You’ll gain knowledge and understanding of different areas of psychology; develop valuable analytical and communication skills; and enhance your ability to work both independently and collaboratively. This will put you in a strong position when it comes to employment opportunities."

A-Levels - Grades B to C

September 1998 - September 2001

Film Studies, Psychology, English Language and Biology

Undertook 4 A-Levels in Film Studies, Psychology, English Language and Biology and achieved grades B - C across the subjects.

Skills

Cloud Platforms

Worked extensively across the AWS platform as well as Azure DevOps

AWS
Azure

DevOps Tools

Worked with a variety of DevOps tooling, the highlights of which include:

AWS CodePipeline / CodeBuild / CodeDeploy
Azure DevOps Platform
Terraform Standalone / Enterprise
Jenkins / Octopus
Docker
Ansible
Kubernetes - AKS / EKS / ECS

Scripting Languages & Tools

Extensive scripting experience including serverless (Lambda)

Python
PowerShell/Core
C# dotnet Core
Bash (light exposure)

Other skills

Other strings to my bow include:

Route 53 / DNS
Lambda
SSL certificates
Linux & Windows server administration
Buildinng web portals (HTML5 & CSS3)
Cloudfront

Interests

Apart from being a DevOps Engineer, I love to build things - anything from a website to an automatic chicken-coop door opener! In the summer I enjoy travelling the UK, hiking, wild swimming and boating.

When at home and not studying for a new qualification, I follow a number of sci-fi and fantasy genre movies and television shows, I love to cook, and I spend a large amount of my free time exploring the latest technology advancements (amateur futurist).

More random passions include:

Horror movies, cinema, DIY, camping, cats, chilling with family, travelling UK and Europe, Engineering, electronics, philosophy, cooking, the smell of sawn timber, family, fantasy & scifi, space, retro tech running, antique hunting, hot tubs, sound, music, history, off-grid living.