Google Cloud DevOps Engineer (Temporary Contract)

About You You’re looking for a challenge where you can take ownership of building and maintaining Google Cloud infrastructure for a large-scale operational platform. You will work closely with a platform lead to stand up GKE/Kubernetes clusters, CI/CD pipelines, and cloud-native monitoring, with the heaviest infrastructure work taking place during the first two months as the platform comes online, followed by pipeline maintenance and deployment support through acceptance. This is a platform-focused DevOps role where strong Terraform, Kubernetes, CI/CD, and Git expertise are essential. You will work within defined Dev/QA access boundaries and contribute to a structured delivery process. Note: This role operates under a 5-month contractor model , with at least 4 hours of daily overlap with U.S. Eastern business hours required. You Bring to Applaudo the Following Competencies: Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related field is desired, or equivalent professional experience. 5+ years of professional experience with Terraform on Google Cloud, including building and maintaining infrastructure from an existing baseline. Strong hands-on experience with GKE and Kubernetes cluster setup and management. Experience implementing CI/CD pipelines and environment promotion workflows, preferably using GCP-native tooling such as Cloud Build and Artifact Registry. Experience implementing and maintaining Google Cloud-native monitoring, alerting, and logging using Cloud Monitoring and Cloud Logging. Strong Git fundamentals, including branching strategies, pull requests, and structured commit practices. Experience working within structured engineering environments involving documented designs, code reviews, and ticket-based delivery. Experience using AI-assisted development tools such as Claude Code or similar tools as part of daily development workflows. Excellent communication skills in English, required to collaborate effectively w