Junior Cloud Engineer

Who we are?

Sanlam Financial Markets (“SFM”) is the business unit in Sanlam Group that is responsible for managing shareholder credit, market, and liquidity risks, developing balance-sheet enabled products, and developing solutions to optimize Sanlam’s balance sheet(s) to generate shareholder value. SFM works closely with the Balance Sheet Management function of Sanlam to assist the Balance Sheet Management Function in its pursuit of optimising returns on the Sanlam balance sheet.

Role Purpose

The Junior Cloud Engineer supports Sanlam SFM IT in building, operating, and optimising AWS cloud platforms, while also contributing to application development, support, and documentation. Working under the guidance of the Lead: Cloud Platform Engineering, this role is hands-on and versatile: assisting with cloud infrastructure, automation, monitoring, and day-to-day operations, as well as maintaining and enhancing applications, services, and technical documentation.

This position provides practical exposure to AWS technologies, modern DevOps practices, and business-critical projects (including financial applications like Murex). It also plays a key role in capturing and maintaining knowledge through documentation, ensuring operational reliability, cost efficiency, and long-term success for the organisation.

Key Responsibilities

1. Cloud Operations & Support
• Assist in the daily monitoring and maintenance of AWS environments.
• Support troubleshooting and incident resolution.
• Participate in peer reviews of scripts, IaC templates, and code.
2. Application Development & Maintenance
• Assist in development tasks for new features and enhancements.
• Help maintain existing applications and services, ensuring reliability and compliance.
• Perform bug fixes and minor improvements as assigned.
3. Project Participation
• Support different IT projects across SFM when additional engineering capacity is needed.
• Contribute to testing, deployment, and rollout activities.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams (Cloud, Market Data, Applications).
4. Documentation & Knowledge Management
• Maintain and update technical and operational documentation.
• Create documentation in Confluence where gaps exist.
• Ensure runbooks, playbooks, and procedures remain accurate and up to date

Skills and Experience

Essential

• Basic knowledge of AWS services (EC2, S3, IAM, VPC, Lambda).
• Exposure to programming or scripting (Python, C#, Bash, or PowerShell).
• Familiarity with Linux/Windows server administration.
• Good understanding of software development life cycle (SDLC).
• Strong documentation and communication skills.

Preferred

• Exposure to CI/CD tools (GitHub).
• Knowledge of relational databases (Redshift, Postgres, SQL Server).
• Familiarity with Confluence or other documentation platforms.
• AWS Cloud Practitioner or Associate-level certification.

Key Responsibilities Continues

5. Automation & Best Practices

• Contribute to Infrastructure-as-Code (Terraform/CloudFormation) and CI/CD pipelines.
• Assist in scripting and automation for routine operational tasks.
• Apply coding and design standards in peer-reviewed contributions.

5. Learning & Growth

• Actively develop AWS, DevOps, and software engineering skills under mentorship.
• Work towards AWS and relevant certifications.

                Build a solid understanding of financial markets IT systems (Murex, market data flows

Scope and Impact

• Provides direct operational support for cloud platforms and applications.
• Increases team efficiency by automating manual processes.
• Improves knowledge management by ensuring documentation is accurate and available.
• Supports delivery of strategic IT projects while gaining experience

Career Path

• Short-term: Gain confidence in AWS operations, coding practices, and documentation.
• Medium-term: Progress to Cloud Engineer (independent ownership of components and automation).
• Long-term: Pathway towards Senior Cloud Engineer or DevOps Engineer, with exposure to financial systems like Murex and broader Sanlam cloud initiatives.

Build a successful career with us

We’re all about building strong, lasting relationships with our employees. We know that you have hopes for your future – your career, your personal development and of achieving great things. We pride ourselves in helping  our employees to realise their worth. Through its five business clusters – Sanlam Fintech, Sanlam Life and Savings, Sanlam Investment Group, Sanlam Allianz, Santam, as well as MiWay and the Group Office – the group provides many opportunities for growth and development.

Core Competencies

Turnaround time

The shortlisting process will only start once the application due date has been reached. The time taken to complete this process will depend on how far you progress and the availability of managers. 

Our commitment to transformation