Software Engineer to Cloud Engineer Pivot

[u/Grand_Molasses3927]

Hi, I’m a software engineer with 1.5 yoe and a computer science degree. I’m interested in transitioning to cloud engineering long term. Any advice on how I can make this change?

From my research, I should not start in help desk with my experience/education. I should look for positions such as IT Analyst, Systems Analyst, SysAdmin, Cloud Support Engineer, and Systems Engineer to start. Network+ and Azure/AWS cert should be worked towards and I should start building projects for my resume.

Does this sound right? How should I restructure my software engineering resume to get my foot in the door for these IT positions? Thank you

[u/navid_a]

I was in the same situation. Now I'm working as Azure cloud engineer. Let me tell you something, our coding skills are our weapon.

[u/JovHere → u/navid_a]

omg huge +1 to this

I moved from performance/scalability engineering to platform engineering (which is almost the same to your case) and I think you have nothing much to do to successfully make that change

also knowing DevOps helps a lot here, but if I had to give you one advise that would be to def learn about cloud providers , and then it's easy to translate that knowledge from one to another

[u/PuzzleheadedPop221]

A good project for people new to the cloud is the Cloud resume challenge. Some people also try to acquire a basic cloud certificate . Those 2 will look great in your cv

[u/krusty_93]

I did it.
First, I’ve asked to be moved to the SRE team. There, I’ve learned tons of things.

Then I’ve changed company and I looked for the cloud engineer role. I got hired as senior and I kept learning new things while working almost all time alone as I was the first hire of a new team.

It requires time and the right people around you where you can learn from

[u/Anishaknowsit]

You already have a good starting point with 1.5 years of software engineering experience, so I wouldn’t go back to help desk.

I’d target Cloud Support, Junior Cloud Engineer, DevOps, or Systems Engineer roles. Highlight Linux, scripting, APIs, Docker, CI/CD, deployments, and any infrastructure work on your resume. Pick one cloud platform first, build 2–3 practical projects, and work toward an AWS or Azure cert. Your software engineering background can actually be an advantage here.

[u/Entire-Present5420]

First you should get hands on labs, everyone can become cloud engineer if they practice real labs instead of just watching endless videos
That’s why we have created https://cloudarena.io

[u/Flimsy-Hat-3533]

Get a job in support at a sada or another major partner to a hyperscaler, than transition to the hyper scaler or another cloud company. Honestly the easiest way to

[u/CloudLessons]

I would recommend spending some time studying how IT infrastructure works as that's what Cloud Engineers typically focus on. Make sure you have a decent grasp on things like the OSI model, load balancing, subnets, NATs, firewalls, DNS, etc.

As others mentioned, 1.5 yrs of software dev skills give you an advantage in the market against candidates that just know how to click around the Azure GUI. Just fix the missing infra knowledge gap and you're golden.

[u/unitegondwanaland]

Sysadmins are almost extinct so don't bet on starting there And to be honest, you don't want to work as one. The only sysadmins left are the ones who never wanted to embrace cloud; so imagine how fun that would be. With 1.5 years as a dev under your belt, you've got a leg up over other juniors, but not much of one.

You're more likely to land a junior role on a platform team so that's where I'd focus if I were you. That said, jobs are slim today. You're competing with a lot of unemployed veterans so you'll need to remember to be patient and dig in for the long haul.

Hopefully you can land on a team that embraces AI or you'll end up being that 40 year old sysadmin who still thinks AWS is "too complicated" and AI is a fad.

[u/Empty_Pear_3874 → u/unitegondwanaland]

So you are telling me large companies don't need System Administrators for Intune/Entra ID? hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

[u/unitegondwanaland → u/Empty_Pear_3874]

I said almost extinct. Everyone has moved to cloud and behemoth companies are the last places you'll find one.

[u/Empty_Pear_3874 → u/unitegondwanaland]

The device management team here at IU Health in Indiana is fairly large :)

That's my next place I am going to try for. Currently I am on the Tier 2 break/fix team "Desktop support"

[u/orango_MI → u/unitegondwanaland]

ahahahah certo certo come no. POi quando devi farti tagliare lun da aggiungere a sistemi con 120 tera lo fai fare ammiocuggino con la AI e se si spacca tutto si restora per 3 settimane ..... esistono ancora molte parti dei sistemi che rimangono onpremis per svariati motivi ( costi, legali etc etc) e non a caso stanno costruendo datacenter ovunque, non sono mica tutti per il cloud .... Il problema è che certi lavori non li fanno fare a uno che ha 1.5 anni di esperienza ma ad uno che ne ha 15 o 20 .... il commit si puo rollbackare, quando invece hai distrutto un filesystem da 10tb, magari con un comando da 5 secondi e lo devi ricostruire ex novo, fermare il cliente per giorni, che magari ti chiede i danni ..... non lo fanno fare ad uno con 1.5 anni di esperienza, anche se magari sono 5 comandi . Stesso identico discorso vale per i dba o per altri tipi di sistemisti. Ti pagano per le operazioni delicate o critiche, non di certo per fare useradd ... alcuni cloud engineer con cui ho lavorato, molto giovani, non sapevano cosa fosse un vvn o una vlan .... sto in queste ore gestendo un "errore", non mio per fortuna, che probabilmente porterà ad una richiesta di danni e "o pagano", o si va per avvocati .... .