“How to be a DevOps Engineer” says Alex
‘I joined OVP DevOps team as an associate DevOps engineer where I recently got promoted to a full DevOps engineer.’

Alexandros Ierodiakonou
Job title
DevOps Engineer
What area of Sky do you work in?
I work in Online Video Platform, the cloud streaming platform for Now TV and Sky
What’s your career journey been like up until now?
I joined through the graduate scheme which lasted for a month, then joined the Content Discovery platform for 3 months as a graduate engineer. Afterwards I joined OVP DevOps team as an associate DevOps engineer where I recently got promoted to a full DevOps engineer.
What does a typical day working here look like for you?
I usually come in around 8.30, start working, join the morning stand-up meetings, continue with work until around 12.00 where we head for lunch with team. After we come back, we continue with work/meetings for the rest of the day.
If you’ve been here over one year, how have you made a difference in your role?
During my time here I have worked within the team to create new monitoring infrastructure, provision and deployed services and infrastructure for the team and the Dev teams in OVP, joined the platforms on call rota to support the streaming platform.
What’s been your proudest moment since working here?
During the Christmas period there was a major event on our AWS infrastructure where we had to manage hundreds of servers rebooting and we were working with skeleton crew. Me and the other engineers managed the event successfully, allowing all our streaming services to remain unaffected and running smoothly in AWS during the holiday period.
What’s the most enjoyable thing about your job?
Probably the most enjoyable thing about my job is that we work on a continuously evolving technology field, as the cloud capabilities of the company are evolving it gives us the opportunity to work with new tools, new tech and ideas which always keeps things interesting and engaging in our line of work.
Describe your work/life balance?
I try to keep a good balance in my work and personal life, by meeting friends outside work for a pint and I regularly arrange trips to see new places during holiday periods.
What advice would you give to others trying to develop their career?
It’s very important to have a clear goal on what you want to achieve, what your end goal is for your career. Once you have a clear target, you can then take the steps to reach your end goal and develop your career according to what you want/ aspire to do in your professional life.
An interesting fact/something no one else knows about you?
I once kept my breath underwater for almost 1.50 minutes. I think.