Job Summary
Visionary and deeply technical R&D Architect to drive the operational maturity of the CONNECT Platform. This is high-impact position that will work side-by-side with our COI, system test and execution teams to identify and address complex issues related to reliability/availability, performance, scale and cost. The problem space will span diverse topics such as deployment pipelines, system testing, feature flags, Kubernetes configuration, resource allocation/utilization, cost management, multi-tenancy architectures.
The successful candidate will be responsible for researching, defining, and validating the advanced architectural patterns and practices required to operate our system at scale.
Key Skills and Knowledge
Collaborative Leadership: Partner directly with COI and execution teams to identify challenges and opportunities for maturing our cloud capabilities. This is a role of influence, not authority.
Research & Prototyping: Lead research into emerging technologies and architectural patterns. An example is Prototype and validate solutions that enhance our use of Kubernetes and AKS on Azure, focusing on:
Workload Balancing & Efficiency: Develop advanced strategies for intelligent workload scheduling, auto-scaling, and resource optimization.
Cost Management: Architect and prove out cost-control models that allow the platform to scale efficiently without compromising performance.
Reliability & High Availability: Design and validate architectural patterns that ensure system resilience, fault tolerance, and seamless disaster recovery.
System-Level Validation: Work with system test teams to design and implement experiments that validate the interaction between major system components under stress. Your focus will be on creating scenarios that simulate real-world customer use cases to uncover systemic issues before they reach production.
Knowledge Transfer and Enablement: Act as a catalyst for skill growth by demonstrating the "art of the possible." Through proofs-of-concept and close collaboration, you will provide the technical credibility and motivation necessary for teams to learn, grow, and adopt new operational paradigms.
Key Skills and Knowledge:
Expert-Level Kubernetes: Deep, hands-on knowledge of Kubernetes architecture, including the control plane, scheduling, service mesh, network policies, and resource management.
Azure - AKS Expertise:
AWS - EKS Expertise:
Proven expertise in designing and managing complex, scalable solutions on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) and AWS EKS. Strong command of the broader Azure and AWS ecosystems.
Infrastructure as Code (IaC): Proficiency with tools like Terraform or Bicep for automating the provisioning and management of complex cloud topologies.
CI/CD and GitOps: Strong background in building and optimizing CI/CD pipelines and implementing GitOps principles for automated and reliable application delivery.
Observability: In-depth knowledge of modern observability stacks, including logging, metrics, and tracing (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, Azure Monitor, Open telemetry).
Distributed Systems Architecture: A fundamental understanding of the principles and trade-offs involved in designing and operating large-scale distributed systems.
