Head of Cloud Operations and Engineering

Location: London or Manchester, Hybrid (Up to 2 days per week onsite)  

Contract Type: Full –Time, Permanent  

About the Team 

Bauer Media Audio reaches millions of listeners across live radio, streaming, digital products and on‑demand audio. Our cloud platforms are central to how we create, distribute and monetise audio across the UK and international markets. 

Cloud engineers today sit across Digital, Broadcast Technology and Central Support Services. This role brings those groups together into a single, unified Cloud Engineering & Operations function — one team responsible for reliability, security, operational excellence and the technical foundations that power Bauer’s audio ecosystem. 

About the Role 

We’re looking for a senior technology leader to define and drive the strategic direction of Bauer’s cloud platforms. This role is accountable for how our cloud environments are designed, operated, secured and governed, ensuring they remain resilient, trusted and available 24/7. 

You’ll create clarity where ownership has been fragmented, strengthen our operational discipline, lead during major incidents, and embed security and resilience as continuous, non‑negotiable standards. You will also be a visible senior leader who can communicate confidently with executives, auditors and regulators. 

This is a chance to set the benchmark for how cloud engineering and operations should operate across a modern, multi‑market media organisation. 

Key Responsibilities 

• Set a clear vision and operating model for Cloud Engineering & Operations.
• Define and enforce standards for reliability, security and operational readiness.
• Build and align a unified Cloud Engineering & Ops function across technical teams.
• Provide senior technical leadership and decision‑making in complex environments.
• Own 24×7 operational readiness, including on‑call structures and escalation models.
• Lead major cloud incidents with clear, timely communication to executive stakeholders.
• Deliver measurable operational outcomes (availability, MTTR, change success, security posture).
• Drive post‑incident actions and embed a continuous improvement culture.
• Embed secure‑by‑default patterns across platforms, pipelines and landing zones.
• Own least‑privilege access, secrets management, vulnerability management and compliance.
• Ensure the security posture is observable, measurable and defensible.
• Lead cloud platform contributions to Digital Operational Resilience, including DORA obligations.
• Oversee cloud resilience design, ICT risk controls and regulatory‑ready evidence.
• Ensure cloud platform data is accurate, auditable and available for review.
• Partner closely with Digital, Broadcast Tech, Security, Risk, Audit and Technical Operations teams.
• Ensure effective SLOs and SLAs that align directly with business needs. 

Qualifications 

Essential 

• Proven experience in Cloud Engineering and Cloud Operations 
• Strong cloud expertise (AWS preferred).
• Proven experience running 24×7 operations, on‑call models and major incident leadership.
• Solid understanding of cloud security fundamentals and operational risk.
• Experience with IaC (Terraform), CI/CD and modern cloud engineering.
• Ability to lead, develop and unify high‑performing engineering teams (10-20 team members)
• Strong communication skills, comfortable engaging with executives and regulators. 

Desirable 

• Experience supporting DORA or similar operational resilience frameworks.
• Background in multi‑market or regulated environments.
• Experience improving or consolidating cloud or platform teams.