Karsten
Gorskowski

Freelance DevOps & Platform Engineer

Karsten Gorskowski

Kußmaulstraße 5

76187 Karlsruhe, Germany

Phone: +49 151 44986459

Email: hallo@karsten.cloud

Web: karsten.cloud

Technical Focus
  • Kubernetes Platform Engineering – design, operation, and migration of clusters (k3s, AKS, EKS) including air-gapped deployments
  • GitOps & Continuous Delivery (ArgoCD, Helm, Kustomize, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps)
  • Observability & SIEM – Prometheus, Thanos, Grafana, Elasticsearch/ECK, Kibana, Vector
  • Security & Secrets Management – HashiCorp Vault, cert-manager/PKI, Keycloak/OIDC
  • Event Streaming – Apache Kafka (Strimzi), high-volume data pipelines
  • Infrastructure as Code – Terraform, Ansible
  • Cloud Platforms – AWS, Azure, GCP
  • AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
  • Scrum.org Professional Scrum Master I
  • LFS458: Kubernetes Administration
Project Experience
(Selection)
Freelance DevOps & Platform Engineer
Under NDA – SOC/SIEM Platform, Public Sector
2022 – present, Karlsruhe (remote)
Long-running engagement as senior engineer for a SOC/SIEM enablement platform in the public sector.
Designed and operated an air-gapped Kubernetes platform (k3s) with a full GitOps workflow based on ArgoCD and Kustomize.
Built a high-throughput event ingestion pipeline using Vector, Apache Kafka (Strimzi), and Elasticsearch (ECK).
Implemented full observability infrastructure (Prometheus, Thanos, Grafana), PKI and secrets management (HashiCorp Vault, cert-manager), and identity management (Keycloak/OIDC). Mentored team members.
Technologies:
k3s ECK Elasticsearch Strimzi Kafka Vector ArgoCD Kustomize Helm Prometheus Thanos Grafana HashiCorp Vault cert-manager Keycloak GitLab CI
Cloud Engineer
Under NDA – Industrial Sector
06.2022 – 12.2022
Developed and expanded the company-wide cloud strategy and migrated big data applications to Azure Cloud.
Architected and implemented a service platform based on Azure Kubernetes Service.
Built a centralised monitoring platform based on Kubernetes, Prometheus, Grafana, and Azure monitoring solutions.
Technologies:
Azure Cloud Azure DevOps Terraform Helm Azure Kubernetes Service Prometheus Grafana Loki
Cloud Engineer
Under NDA – Logistics Division, Drugstore Chain
10.2021 – 05.2022, Karlsruhe
Responsible for migrating on-premises workloads to Azure Cloud.
Iteratively replaced legacy deployments with an Infrastructure-as-Code model driven by Azure DevOps Pipelines.
Implemented and migrated individual workloads to managed Azure Kubernetes clusters.
Technologies:
Azure Cloud Azure DevOps Terraform Ansible Docker Helm Azure Kubernetes Service
DevOps Engineer
Under NDA – On-Demand Mobility Platform
04.2018 – 01.2019, Karlsruhe
Built, maintained, and operated multiple Kubernetes clusters on AWS infrastructure across Europe and China in an agile (Scrum) environment.
Provided GitLab and tooling for CI/CD, monitoring, logging, and alerting for both the platform and developer teams.
Operated and was on-call for a central HiveMQ MQTT cluster; handled operational tasks and incidents in Kanban mode.
Technologies:
Kubernetes Terraform AWS ELK GitLab HiveMQ Keycloak OpsGenie
Work History
Self-employed / Freelancer
Freelance DevOps & Platform Engineer
01.2023 – present, Karlsruhe
Freelance project work in platform engineering, Kubernetes, observability, and GitOps. Primary engagement: long-running SOC/SIEM platform project in the public sector.
inovex GmbH
Senior DevOps Engineer
04.2018 – 12.2022, Karlsruhe
Responsible for designing and delivering cloud-native products and platforms for enterprise clients across Germany in a wide range of industries.
Designed cloud infrastructure, deployment pipelines, and operational processes. Built logging, monitoring, and alerting solutions.
codemonauts UG
DevOps Engineer
12.2014 – 04.2018, Frankfurt am Main
Responsible for migrating existing and building new client infrastructures on AWS following the Infrastructure-as-Code principle. Monitoring, automation, CI/CD workflows, and 24/7 on-call within agreed SLAs.
Senckenberg Research Institute
System Administrator
10.2012 – 10.2014, Frankfurt am Main
Windows Server & Client support and administration.
Leistritz AG
System Administrator
10.2011 – 10.2012, Nuremberg
Windows Server & Client support and administration.
MCF Microcomputer GmbH & Co.
Apprentice / System Administrator
09.2007 – 09.2011, Nuremberg
Apprenticeship as IT Systems Integration Specialist. Retained as System Administrator after qualifying.
Education
IT Systems Integration Specialist (Fachinformatiker Systemintegration)
MCF GmbH und Co KG
09.2007 – 07.2010
Magister: German Studies, English Studies & Philosophy
University of Osnabrück
10.2002 – 03.2007
No degree awarded
Cognitive Science
University of Osnabrück
10.2000 – 10.2002
No degree awarded
Abitur (German A-levels)
Kreisgymnasium Haren (Ems)
1999
Grade: 2.0 (Good)
Skills &
Competencies
  • Agile working in distributed teams (DevOps, Scrum, Kanban)
  • Scrum.org Certified Professional Scrum Master I
  • Structured, autonomous delivery with low overhead
  • Technical communication to developers, management, and stakeholders
  • Cross-disciplinary problem solving; mentoring of colleagues
  • Continuous learning and fast onboarding of new technologies
  • Native language: German
  • English: fluent (spoken and written)