AWS Cloud Engineer (Serverless & IaC)

We are sharing a specialised part-time consulting opportunity for experienced AWS Cloud Engineers with strong hands-on expertise in serverless architecture, event-driven systems, infrastructure as code, and multi-service AWS environments. This role focuses on evaluating technical tasks involving AWS serverless applications and infrastructure-as-code implementations for correctness, architectural quality, reproducibility, and cross-service integration. Selected engineers will review cloud designs, permissions, failure handling, deployment definitions, and testing approaches while providing clear, rubric-based technical feedback.

Key Responsibilities

AWS Serverless Architecture - Review multi-service serverless applications built on AWS - Assess architecture involving Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, DynamoDB Streams, S3, EventBridge, SNS, SQS, and Step Functions - Evaluate service selection, integration patterns, and architectural trade-offs - Identify incorrect assumptions or weaknesses in serverless designs - Assess whether implementations follow sound cloud architecture principles Infrastructure as Code - Review infrastructure definitions built with AWS CDK, CloudFormation, or SAM - Assess whether infrastructure code accurately represents the intended architecture - Identify configuration errors, missing resources, or incorrect dependencies - Evaluate deployment structure and infrastructure reproducibility - Review IaC implementations for consistency and technical correctness Event-Driven Systems - Evaluate event-driven architectures spanning multiple AWS services - Review event sources, routing, triggers, subscriptions, and downstream processing - Assess asynchronous workflows for correctness and resilience - Identify broken integration patterns or unintended event behaviour - Evaluate whether service interactions reflect realistic AWS behaviour IAM & Security Boundaries - Review IAM roles, policies, and permission boundaries - Assess whether services receive appropriate access without unnecessary privileges - Identify missing, excessive, or incorrectly scoped permissions - Evaluate cross-service authentication and authorisation requirements - Apply practical AWS security principles when reviewing task implementations Failure, Retry & Recovery Behaviour - Assess failure-handling and retry semantics across serverless workflows - Review dead-letter queues, retry policies, timeouts, and asynchronous failure paths - Identify scenarios that could cause duplicate processing, lost events, or uncontrolled retries - Evaluate idempotency and recovery considerations - Assess whether failure behaviour matches actual AWS service semantics Testing & Local Emulation - Review testing strategies for AWS serverless applications - Evaluate local development and emulation approaches using tools such as LocalStack - Identify behavioural differences between emulated environments and real AWS services - Assess whether local tests provide sufficient confidence in production behaviour - Review integration and end-to-end testing approaches Cross-Service Integration - Evaluate integrations between compute, storage, messaging, API, and orchestration services - Review resource dependencies and service configuration - Identify mismatches between infrastructure definitions and application behaviour - Assess data flow across multi-service architectures - Determine whether integrations function correctly under realistic conditions Observability & Operational Quality - Review logging, monitoring, tracing, and operational visibility where relevant - Assess whether serverless workloads can be effectively diagnosed in production - Identify missing observability or operational safeguards - Evaluate performance and scalability considerations - Review opportunities for serverless cost optimisation where applicable Rubric-Based Technical Evaluation - Assess assigned cloud engineering tasks against structured technical criteria - Provide clear written explanations supporting evaluation decisions - Reference specific architectural, infrastructure, or implementation evidence - Apply grading standards consistently across assignments - Distinguish substantive cloud architecture problems from reasonable alternative designs Ideal Profile - 3+ years of hands-on experience building multi-service AWS serverless applications - Strong professional experience with AWS Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, EventBridge, SNS/SQS, and Step Functions - Strong experience with infrastructure as code using AWS CDK, CloudFormation, or SAM - Deep understanding of event-driven architecture - Strong knowledge of IAM permissions and security boundaries - Experience designing and evaluating failure, retry, and recovery behaviour in distributed systems - Familiarity with LocalStack or comparable local AWS testing approaches - Ability to distinguish local emulation behaviour from actual AWS service behaviour - Strong cloud architecture, debugging, and technical review skills - AWS certifications such as Solutions Architect or Developer are advantageous - Experience with serverless observability and cost optimisation is preferred - Previous code-review or technical task-grading experience is advantageous - Strong written communication and ability to provide precise technical feedback Engagement Details - Part-time independent contractor engagement - Fully remote within the United States - Flexible scheduling based on project requirements - Compensation: $60–$80/hour - Work focuses on AWS serverless architecture, infrastructure as code, event-driven systems, integration correctness, and technical quality evaluation - Projects may be extended, shortened, or concluded based on project needs and performance - Work must be completed without using confidential or proprietary information belonging to any employer, client, institution, or other third party - H1-B and STEM OPT support is unavailable for this engagement About the Platform - This opportunity is available through 24-MAG LLC. We connect experienced professionals with remote consulting opportunities across technical, evaluation, and project-based workstreams. - By submitting this application, you acknowledge that your information may be processed by 24-MAG LLC for recruitment and opportunity matching in accordance with our Privacy Policy: https://www.24-mag.com/privacy-policy