Cloud Principal Architect at AF Group in New York, New York

Job Description:

This will be a Principal Cloud Architect position part of the Cloud Data Center team that will be responsible for implementing solutions for business applications in Azure and AWS Public Clouds. This person will be multi-cloud SME with knowledge about traditional data centers and technologies such as Active Directory to support a hybrid cloud environment. The Principal Cloud Architect will be providing Cloud Infrastructure support to cross-functional teams such as Data Science teams on data strategy and AI initiatives. They will also be involved in the strategic planning and improvement of our Infrastructure-as-Code automation tools such as Terraform, CI/CD pipelines including migration from Azure DevOps to GitHub Enterprise.

• This role will be working with the Enterprise Architecture team to create reference architectures for our business application infrastructure in Private/Public Clouds including disaster recovery and business resiliency plans.
• Along with reference architectures, he/she can help facilitate necessary documentation of new tools and technologies to help Ops and Tier 1 or 2 teams to resolve issues quicker while avoiding escalations.
• This role will not only help with a roadmap for Linux environment, but also help operationalize our linux support model working closely with Ops team.
• Other teams such as Data and Data Science teams have Azure Public Cloud and other AI or data technology initiatives that this person will support and help deliver.
• This role will also be able to contribute to our migration from Azure DevOps to GitHub Enterprise efforts to improve our app delivery pipelines
• Accountable for adhering to corporate architecture standards, ensuring technology standards and best practices are maintained across the organization and contributing to corporate architecture strategy-setting.
• Participates in formulating solution estimates and work planning including determining appropriate task sequencing and identification of technical skill sets required.
• Builds consensus around principles of infrastructure architecture and interprets and clarifies these principles.
• Participates in the evaluation, selection and implementation of AWS technology solutions including providing detailed analysis of pros and cons.
• Maintains operational, architectural and design documentation including procedures, task lists, and reference architecture.
• Evaluates strengths and flaws in infrastructure design including performance, quality, availability, simplicity of design, security, and total cost of ownership.
• Assists in the facilitation of project handoffs including preparing documentation, educating, and supporting to ensure smooth transitions.
• Establishes and maintains relationships with IT and business area partners and provides consultation to the business teams.
• Troubleshoots, recommends, and executes action plans for issue resolution.
• Selects and designs tools that allow reuse of design components and patterns between projects.
• Continually works to enhance breadth and depth of knowledge and experience. Benchmarks technology strategies and architectures. Monitors and anticipates trends and investigates organizational objectives and needs. Prepares bench marking reports and presentations.
• Promotes implementation of new technology, solutions, and methods to improve business processes, efficiency, effectiveness, and value delivered to customers.
• Develops actual working solutions or prototypes based on their own designs and resolves any issues that arise.
• Stays updated on current technology trends and industry best practices.
• Provides technical leadership and works effectively with different teams including Product Managers, Project Managers, and Engineers.
• Fosters a healthy, collaborative, and productive scrum team culture.
• Works with other leads in a project setting to define and execute a software architecture that is sustainable, flexible, and scalable.
• Leads key initiative design, highly capable to complete tasks both independently with minimal guidance and leading a team technically.
• Exchanges information clearly and precisely, in verbal or written form, by sharing ideas, reporting facts and other information, responding to questions, and employing active listening techniques.
• Works with networks and understands internet security protocols. Analyze existing systems to ensure adequate security and business continuality.
• Create designs to support appropriate technology choices
• Promotes and conducts software development best practices such as dependency injection and test-driven development to create high-quality, flexible, scalable applications that can be easily configured for different client needs.
• Assisting in the structuring of data including methods of storing and retrieving data
• Facilitates and creates reporting tools and automating the delivery of reports to dashboards.
• Creates data interfaces and facilitates API extraction of data.
• Guide project teams with the implementations consistent with company policies and practices
• Align projects with business and IT strategy to help projects sustain alignment with company policy's and standards.
• Write policy and standards as needed to sustain company compliance with regulatory changes.
• Development of product roadmaps and align efforts to meet security goals.

EDUCATION

• Bachelor's degree in computer science or related area required. Master's preferred.
• Continuous learning, as defined by the Company's learning philosophy, is required.
• Azure or AWS Solution Architect certification or progress toward certification is highly preferred and encouraged. Prior development and scrum/agile experience.
• Working experiences with relational and No-SQL databases such as MongoDB, Azure CosmosDB, AWS DynamoDB are preferred.

EXPERIENCE

• 7+ years' experience in the architecture, design, implementation, and maintenance of enterprise level systems in public cloud.
• Experience in a large complex enterprise environment, preferably in Healthcare, Insurance, or similarly government-regulated environment.

QUALIFICATIONS

• 5+ years experience working with Linux servers, preferred
• 3+ years experience working with Kubernetes and containerized solutions
• Experience working with public cloud AI solutions

Azure Expertise:

• Strong knowledge and hands-on experience with Azure Networking (Virtual Networks, ExpressRoute, VPNs).
• Expertise in Azure PaaS offerings such as Azure SQL, Azure Files, Azure Functions, Azure Logic Apps, and Azure Data Factory.
• Experience in VM management within Azure, including VM scaling, storage solutions, and VM performance optimization.
• Solid understanding of Azure Active Directory (AAD), RBAC, and IAM principles, with experience in configuring role assignments, conditional access, and identity management.

Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC):

• Strong experience in using Terraform to deploy, configure, and manage Azure resources.
• Familiarity with version control systems like Git and collaboration through tools such as GitHub or Azure DevOps.

Cloud Migration:

• Proven experience assisting in cloud migration projects to Azure, including both re-hosting and re-platforming strategies.
• Knowledge of Azure Migrate or similar tools for moving on-premises workloads to the cloud.

On-Premises Infrastructure:

• Experience with Windows Server administration, including Active Directory, GPO, DNS, and DHCP.
• Familiarity with VMware ESXi and vCenter, including the management of virtualized environments and hybrid cloud configurations.

Security & Compliance:

• Knowledge of Azure Security Center, Azure Sentinel, and security best practices to monitor and secure Azure resources.
• Experience implementing security policies and compliance controls in the cloud (e.g., encryption, monitoring, and access control).

Data:

• Knowledge and understanding of structuring data and the methods of storing and retrieving data.
• Knowledge of data masking and encryption, reporting tools, and automating the delivery of reports to dashboards and customers
• Ability to create data interfaces and API extraction of data.
• Familiarity of data tools such as Data Bricks, PowerBI, ElasticSearch, and SAS
• Knowledge of relational databases such as Amazon RDS, Greenplum, Hadoop, MS SQL, Postgress, MySQL, & Oracle SQL

WORKING CONDITIONS:



Work is performed in an office setting with no unusual hazards.



PAY RANGE



Actual compensation decision relies on the consideration of internal equity, candidate's skills and professional experience, geographic location, market and other potential factors. It is not standard practice for an offer to be at or near the top of the range, and therefore a reasonable estimate for this role is between $80,900 and $211,900.


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