Lead DevOps Engineer - Remote

Optum Tech is a global leader in health care innovation. Our teams develop cutting-edge solutions that help people live healthier lives and help make the health system work better for everyone. From advanced data analytics and AI to cybersecurity, we use innovative approaches to solve some of health care's most complex challenges. Your contributions here have the potential to change lives. Ready to build the next breakthrough? Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

As a Lead DevOps Engineer within UnitedHealthcare Medicare & Retirement, you will lead the design, build, and deployment of enterprise-scale cloud infrastructure, automated CI/CD pipelines, and AI-powered automation solutions supporting critical Medicare platforms. In this role, you will leverage enterprise-approved AI tools to streamline technical workflows, architect continuous delivery pipelines for traditional and AI/ML applications, and drive responsible AI adoption across engineering operations. You will collaborate closely with software engineering, data science, and security teams to build resilient, scalable infrastructure that accelerates the delivery of high-quality healthcare services for millions of Medicare-eligible individuals.

You'll enjoy the flexibility to work remotely * from anywhere within the U.S. as you take on some tough challenges. For all hires in the Minneapolis or Washington, D.C. area, you will be required to work in the office a minimum of four days per week.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Design, develop, and deploy AI-powered solutions and automated pipelines to address complex infrastructure and delivery challenges, with a focus on responsible use of AI
• Use enterprise-approved AI tools to streamline engineering workflows, automate infrastructure management tasks, and drive continuous operational improvement
• Evaluate emerging technology and AI trends to inform solution design, platform architecture, and strategic innovation across DevOps operations
• Architect, build, and maintain robust CI/CD pipelines, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), and automated deployment solutions across multi-cloud environments
• Establish MLOps infrastructure and deployment frameworks to support model lifecycle management, monitoring, and AI/ML pipeline automation
• Drive adoption of Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles, container orchestration (Kubernetes), and automated testing standards across technical teams
• Create enterprise telemetry, logging, and alerting systems to ensure high availability, security, and performance across healthcare delivery platforms
• Partner with security, privacy, and compliance leaders to enforce pipeline compliance, automated security testing, and responsible AI governance
• Provide technical leadership, mentorship, and architectural guidance to DevOps and software engineering teams

You'll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.

Required Qualifications:

• 5+ years of experience in DevOps engineering, site reliability engineering, or cloud platform infrastructure
• 3+ years of experience designing and managing automated CI/CD pipelines (e.g., Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, or Azure DevOps)
• 3+ years of experience with Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools (e.g., Terraform, CloudFormation, or Ansible)
• 3+ years of hands-on experience with cloud platforms (e.g., Azure, AWS, or Google Cloud Platform) and container orchestration technologies (e.g., Kubernetes, Docker, OpenShift)
• 2+ years of experience building, deploying, and maintaining AI/ML pipelines, MLOps tooling, or AI-powered automation solutions
• 2+ years of experience implementing monitoring, observability, and alerting solutions (e.g., Datadog, Splunk, Prometheus, Grafana, or Dynatrace)
• 1+ years of experience scripting or programming in languages such as Python, Bash, Go, or PowerShell

Preferred Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Artificial Intelligence, or a related technical field (or equivalent practical experience)
• Professional cloud, DevOps, or AI/ML certifications (e.g., AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, Azure DevOps Engineer Expert, Certified Kubernetes Administrator, or AWS/Azure AI Specialist certifications)
• Experience integrating GenAI models, LLM tooling, or automated code analysis capabilities into CI/CD pipelines
• Experience operating within a regulated healthcare, HIPAA-compliant, or financial services environment
• Proven leadership experience driving enterprise-scale DevOps transformations and automation initiatives

*All employees working remotely will be required to adhere to UnitedHealth Group's Telecommuter Policy.

Pay is based on several factors including but not limited to local labor markets, education, work experience, certifications, etc. In addition to your salary, we offer benefits such as, a comprehensive benefits package, incentive and recognition programs, equity stock purchase and 401k contribution (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). No matter where or when you begin a career with us, you'll find a far-reaching choice of benefits and incentives. The salary for this role will range from $112,700 - $193,200 annually based on full-time employment. We comply with all minimum wage laws as applicable.

Application Deadline: This will be posted for a minimum of 2 business days or until a sufficient candidate pool has been collected. Job posting may come down early due to volume of applicants.

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone-of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income-deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes - an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.

UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer under applicable law and qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, national origin, religion, age, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by local, state, or federal laws, rules, or regulations.

UnitedHealth Group is a drug - free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.