Principal Enterprise Architect (Linux) - 1790

Location: Monday - Friday - Onsite in Richardson, TX
Relocation: Offered
Employment Type: Direct Hire - Full-Time Employment
Salary Range: $150K - $175K + bonus
Residency Requirements: US Citizens and all other parties authorized to work in the US are encouraged to apply.

Ideal Candidate
The successful candidate combines deep technical expertise with strong leadership capabilities. They are comfortable operating at both the strategic and operational levels, can effectively influence stakeholders, and thrive in environments where they can drive technology initiatives while remaining hands-on with infrastructure operations.

Position Overview

We are seeking an experienced Principal Enterprise Architect to provide strategic and hands-on leadership across enterprise infrastructure platforms and services. This individual will play a key role in maintaining and optimizing existing infrastructure environments while driving the design, implementation, and adoption of new technology solutions aligned with organizational standards and business objectives.

The ideal candidate will bring deep Linux systems administration and enterprise infrastructure experience, with a strong background leading complex migration and modernization initiatives. This includes planning and executing migrations between enterprise virtualization and infrastructure platforms (such as VMware to Nutanix), data center transformations, and large-scale infrastructure upgrades. This is not a cloud-focused architecture role; rather, it requires expertise in on-premises and hybrid enterprise infrastructure environments.

The ideal candidate is a proactive technical leader with strong problem-solving abilities, excellent communication skills, and a passion for delivering reliable, scalable, and secure infrastructure solutions. This role requires both strategic vision and a willingness to be hands-on when needed.

Participation in an on-call rotation and occasional after-hours or weekend work may be required to support critical business operations.

Key Responsibilities

Lead infrastructure-related projects and strategic technology initiatives from planning through implementation.
Lead and execute enterprise infrastructure migration projects, including virtualization platform migrations (e.g., VMware to Nutanix), server migrations, storage migrations, and data center modernization initiatives.
Architect, plan, and implement Linux-based infrastructure solutions while ensuring operational stability, scalability, and security.
Assess existing infrastructure environments and develop migration roadmaps, risk mitigation plans, and implementation strategies.
Manage and support enterprise infrastructure environments, including monitoring, administration, upgrades, patching, security, and performance optimization.
Provide technical leadership across virtualization, backup, compute, storage, and data center technologies.
Develop and implement automation solutions to streamline operational processes and improve efficiency.
Drive infrastructure modernization efforts and continuous improvement initiatives.
Mentor and support team members by sharing technical expertise and promoting professional growth.
Create and maintain technical documentation, architecture diagrams, operational procedures, and user guides.
Serve as an escalation point for complex infrastructure and operational issues.
Collaborate with cross-functional teams to deliver enterprise technology solutions.
Support security, compliance, and governance initiatives across infrastructure platforms.
Present technical concepts, project updates, and recommendations to both technical and executive audiences.
Troubleshoot and resolve critical production and service-impacting issues.
Participate in disaster recovery planning, testing, and execution activities.
Adhere to established change management and operational processes.

Required Qualifications

Bachelor's degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent experience.
10+ years of experience supporting enterprise infrastructure environments.
Strong hands-on Linux systems administration experience in large enterprise environments.
Experience leading infrastructure migration projects, including VMware to Nutanix migrations, virtualization platform transformations, server migrations, storage migrations, and related infrastructure modernization initiatives.
Experience managing enterprise virtualization platforms such as VMware, Nutanix, Hyper-V, or similar technologies.
Deep knowledge of enterprise compute, storage, virtualization, and operating system architecture.
Experience troubleshooting and supporting complex Linux-based production environments.
Strong understanding of networking concepts, protocols, and infrastructure design principles.
Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
Familiarity with data privacy, security standards, regulatory requirements, and industry best practices.
Strong proficiency with Microsoft Office applications.

Preferred Qualifications

Advanced Linux administration and performance tuning experience.
Experience with Nutanix AHV environments and migration tooling.
Experience designing and implementing enterprise infrastructure modernization initiatives.
Experience with infrastructure automation using Ansible, PowerShell, Python, or similar technologies.
Working knowledge of enterprise backup and recovery solutions.
Familiarity with security frameworks and hardening standards including NIST, CIS Benchmarks, and related industry standards.
Experience with scripting or software development in one or more programming languages.
Knowledge of containerization technologies such as Kubernetes.