Systems Engineer II (REMOTE)
NRTC is Member Driven and Technology Focused – providing solutions that help our 1,500 electric and telephone members bring all the advantages of today’s evolving technology to rural America. NRTC’s solutions are developed specifically to meet the needs of rural utilities and their customers, and include integrated broadband, managed services, smart grid, mobile and video solutions. We are a dynamic, growing cooperative with more than 800 employees operating out of eight office locations.
Job Summary
Systems Engineer II will support our internal and external IT operations, internal network, and DevOps processes for our development efforts. The DevSecOps team is currently modernizing the infrastructure of 5+ Acquisitions of NRTC in recent years. We intend to standardize Ubuntu Linux as base, with containers for applications. In the process we will take the old systems, move them into infrastructure as code and redeploy as needed.
Responsibilities
Use Ansible, Terraform, and similar tools to monitor, manage, and automate Linux servers and network devices
Deploy and maintain customer-facing applications in a containerized environment, leveraging various orchestration platforms and configuration templates
Create and maintain runbooks for routine operations, incident response, and disaster recovery; automate repeatable steps wherever possible
Design, build, and maintain centralized logging and observability pipelines (ELK/EFK, Prometheus/Grafana, or cloud-native alternatives); author alert rules and dashboards to focus on key metrics
Convert manual legacy configurations into IaC; containerize legacy applications and integrate them into CI/CD pipelines (GitLab CI, Bitbucket Pipelines, Jenkins, GitHub Actions)
Integrate host- and container-level vulnerability scanning into build pipelines
Develop scripts and automation (Bash, Python) to reduce manual tasks
Configure and maintain cloud infrastructure (AWS EC2, VPC, IAM, S3, RDS, CloudWatch) using Terraform or CloudFormation
Mentor peers on container concepts, IaC, and DevSecOps best practices.
Other duties as assigned
Qualifications
Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities
Proficient in core networking principles
Proficient with Linux, Familiarity with Both Centos and Ubuntu
Work independently or as part of a team to diagnose and troubleshoot issues
Ability to learn and understand current and evolving technologies both at a high level and at a detailed level • Infrastructure-as-Code (Terraform, CloudFormation) and configuration management (Ansible, Puppet, or Chef). Container orchestration concepts—deploying and managing containers at scale with templated configurations.
Cloud experience—managing AWS (EC2, VPC, IAM, S3, RDS, CloudWatch) or equivalent
Centralized logging and monitoring (ELK/EFK, Prometheus, Grafana, or cloud-native)
IT security fundamentals
Strong troubleshooting skills across infrastructure, networking, and applications
Scripting proficiency (Bash, Python) for automation and diagnostics
Excellent written and verbal communication; able to create runbooks, documentation, and train others
Self-motivated, detail-oriented, and proactive; exercises good judgment in escalating issues
Minimum Education and Experience
Demonstrable experience can be subsisted for any of the before requirements. Examples being Open Source, personal or community project
Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, MIS or related field preferred
Five (5) years managing Linux server infrastructure (installation, configuration, troubleshooting, and security). Two (2) years managing containerization and orchestration concepts in production
Two (2) years managing AWS or other cloud environments—designing VPCs, provisioning services, and implementing IaC
Experience migrating legacy systems into IaC frameworks and automating deployments
Note: How you developed your skills matters less than being able to demonstrate them. You will be evaluated on the skills listed on your CV that are relevant to our technology stack and business.
Physical Demands
This position requires on call support rotation – 24x7 support
Minimum domestic travel possible, approximately 5%
Work is typically performed in a remote office setting
Disclaimer: The above job description summary is intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by individuals assigned to this position. It is not intended to be an exhaustive list of required responsibilities, duties and skills.
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