Project Manager at computer examining code and working on project

DevOps engineers deploy a variety of tools and practices to help speed organizations’ development of applications and services. Because there’s no one “true” pathway to a full-time DevOps career, some budding DevOps practitioners are confused about the “ideal” DevOps engineer resume template. What do they need to include in their resume—or leave off? 

For any technologist considering whether to pivot to a career in DevOps, offering sample projects and related experiences are good ways to show understanding and basic competency. When it comes to choosing which skills to highlight on a resume, it really depends on the requirements described in the job posting, which can vary wildly from company to company. 

What Is DevOps?

Before we dig down into the particulars of a DevOps resume, we need to answer a fundamental question: what is DevOps? To put it as simply as possible, DevOps methodologies and tools help organizations accelerate their building and adoption of crucial services.

To get a little more granular, a good DevOps strategy embraces three areas:

  • Technology (CI/CD, automation, testing tools, etc.)
  • Processes and methodology (i.e., Agile and Scrum)
  • Team and internal culture (everyone aligned toward the same goal!)

If you’re totally new to DevOps, there are three key areas to explore during your learning time:

And once you’ve mastered the fundamentals of DevOps, you can start thinking about the arc of a proper DevOps career. Fortunately, there are multiple paths to becoming a full-fledged DevOps expert, and all are equally valid. Training (and possibly certifications) will prove key.

List Technical Proficiencies Right Away 

Jakub Kubryński, CEO and co-founder of DevSkiller, identified a certain set of skills necessary for the candidate to convey they understand the various aspects of the DevOps role.

These include: 

  • Public clouds and hyperscalers like AWS/GCP/Azure
  • Containerization and cloud-native applications (+GitOps)
  • CI/CD (Jenkins, Azure DevOps, AWS CodePipeline and AWS CodeBuild, Google Cloud Build, TeamCity, Bamboo, and others)

Other essential platforms and skill sets include: 

  • Monitoring and observability (Elasticsearch [ELK/EFK Stack], Prometheus, Grafana, Datadog, New Relic)
  • Agile development methodology (Scrum) 
  • IaaS platforms including the cloud-agonistic Terraform, AWS’ CloudFormation, Microsoft Azure ARM templates, Google Cloud Deployment Manager, and shell scripting/Python/Ansible.

Dave Walters, CTO at Hired.com, added that DevOps engineers should demonstrate fundamental skill sets on their resumes, including proficiency in scripting and coding languages such as Python, Ruby, Java, Javascript, PHP, Bash, Shell, and Node.js.

“In certain DevOps roles, scripting may be a primary focus, and others may require core competencies in automation, build support, tests, deploys, observability,” he said. “Having a clear stance in these spaces will set a resume apart, as will constructive indications of tool agnosticism.” 

Sample DevOps Engineer Resume Template

Before we go further, let's look at a sample DevOps engineer resume template:


DevOps-Engineer-Sample-Resume Download

Include Certifications that Emphasize Vendor Proficiency 

When it comes to listing DevOps-related certifications, Kubryński said the most valuable are the ones that incorporate real-life scenarios in the exams and emphasize vendor/industry best practices. He would recommend Azure, AWS, CNCF, and GCP on a Professional/Expert level.

“Having said that, I need to emphasize that certification is only supplementary to commercial hands-on experience,” he said. “Sure, certificates show ambition and willingness to learn but they won’t replace practical skills acquired by playing an active role in real professional projects.”

Walters added that, if engineers do not have applicable past job experiences or traditional degrees in DevOps, they should definitely highlight relevant skills and certifications on their resumes. “In this competitive hiring landscape, many employers are valuing relevant skills, including certifications such as the Docker Certified Associate, and AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, rather than pure pedigree—particularly as the number of tech professionals, including software engineers, acquire skills through nontraditional avenues, and this continues to steadily increase year-over-year,” he said. 

Kubryński added it might be difficult to highlight your development experience in detail in a resume. “The best advice I can give is to simply add a link to your GitHub repository, next to the list of known languages and frameworks,” he said. “But fear not, neither recruiters nor hiring managers will be assessing your coding skills based solely on your resume. This happens during the next stage of the recruitment process called tech screening, where you’ll be given a task to solve.”

Highlight Teamwork and Communications Skills 

From Kubryński’s perspective, the two most important soft skills one should focus on are communication and teamwork. “DevOps specialists aim to improve various aspects of the software development lifecycle, so they have a lot of touchpoints with various stakeholders,” he said. “That means they need to be able to communicate clearly, show a decent level of empathy, and be team players.”

Walters also noted how, in the current remote and hybrid work landscape, soft skills have become critical in addressing new challenges on the job—everything from communicating asynchronously on tight-deadline projects to managing cross-functional and dynamic teams. To showcase their ability to thrive in this new working environment, DevOps specialists should use the skills section of their resume to highlight communication, collaboration, and time-management skills, as well as a willingness to adapt to new technologies.

“Certain DevOps positions may deal in an inter-team primary function, whereas the others may entail co-responsibility of development and ops aspects,” Walters said. “Depending on the role, it may be beneficial to highlight a combination of soft interpersonal skills and with technical skills.”

When tailoring any past experiences to the role in question, it’s critical to convey how your use of DevOps principles allowed other stakeholders to perform their jobs more efficiently (and securely). 

Having seen many resumes for technical roles, Kubryński thinks what makes a DevOps resume stand out is the inclusion of a variety of skills from different domains. “In order to get your CV across to the reader, you need to include certain keywords which will show that you understand the role, such as CI/CD, Azure DevOps, Pipelines, Jenkins, groovy, and arm templates,” he said. “If you entwine those keywords in the description of your previous roles and possessed skills, your resume should be good to go.”

How Much Do DevOps Jobs Pay?

According to Dice’s latest Tech Salary Report, a DevOps engineer can earn an average salary of $136,017, a number that increased an eye-bleeding 14.1 percent between 2021 and 2022. That hints at solid demand for those with DevOps skills; for those who are trying to land a DevOps position, that demand can also translate into a bit of leverage when it comes time to negotiate for salary, perks and benefits.

 

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