Job Description. General Details. Infrastructure Architect (DS17/ITR1i) Grade/Salary: 7. Date Prepared: 10/11/16. Job Purpose

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1 Job escription General etails Job title: School/Service: Normal Workbase: Tenure: Hours/FT: Infrastructure Architect (S17/ITR1i) igital Services Stoke-on-Trent Campus Permanent 1.0 FT Grade/Salary: 7 ate Prepared: 10/11/16 Job Purpose Responsible for the creation and maintenance of the target infrastructure architecture and roadmap and the specification of the steps required towards achieving the target architecture. nsures that the target infrastructure model guides the design, development and integration of all digital solutions with a view to enhance University digital services while reducing the costs of provision. Acts as the principal digital infrastructure technical authority accountable for the high-level design of solution components to ensure the on-going compatibility/coherence with the enterprise architecture. Conducts periodic strategic assessments, identifying gaps between current and future capabilities, and outlining the transition to the future state that aligns with the overall enterprise architecture. Manages the team responsible for the provision of stable, available, and resilient infrastructure systems and services including the provision of second and third line infrastructure support services. Relationships Reporting to: Networks and Infrastructure Manager Responsible for: SFIAplus Alignment Core Skills: Systems software Level 5; Storage management Level 5 Supplemented by: Solution architecture Level 5; Problem management Level 5 SFIAplus Core Level efinition Level 5: nsure, advise Autonomy Works under broad direction. Work is often self-initiated. Is fully responsible for meeting allocated technical and/or project/supervisory objectives. stablishes milestones and has a significant role in the assignment of tasks and/or responsibilities. Influence Influences organisation, customers, suppliers, partners and peers on the contribution of own specialism. Builds appropriate and effective business relationships. Makes decisions which impact the success of assigned work, i.e. 1

2 results, deadlines and budget. Has significant influence over the allocation and management of resources appropriate to given assignments. Complexity Performs an extensive range and variety of complex technical and/or professional work activities. Undertakes work which requires the application of fundamental principles in a wide and often unpredictable range of contexts. Understands the relationship between own specialism and wider customer/organisational requirements. Business Skills Advises on the available standards, methods, tools and applications relevant to own specialism and can make appropriate choices from alternatives. Analyses, designs, plans, executes and evaluates work to time, cost and quality targets. Assesses and evaluates risk. Communicates effectively, both formally and informally. emonstrates leadership. Facilitates collaboration between stakeholders who have diverse objectives. Takes all requirements into account when making proposals. Takes initiative to keep skills up to date. Mentors colleagues. Maintains an awareness of developments in the industry. Analyses requirements and advises on scope and options for continuous operational improvement. emonstrates creativity, innovation and ethical thinking in applying solutions for the benefit of the customer/stakeholder. Main Activities Leads development of infrastructure architectures, ensuring consistency with specified requirements agreed with both external and internal customers. Takes full responsibility for ensuring that the architectures balance functional, service quality and systems management requirements and costs. nsures that appropriate standards (corporate, industry, national and international) are adhered to. Within a business change programme, manages the programme's target design, policies and standards, working proactively to achieve stable, viable designs, and ensuring consistency of design across projects within the programme. efines the migration path from current mode of operation to the future mode. Monitors technical progress, ensuring that co-ordination and change control are applied to technical specifications and to the technical infrastructure. Advises on the impact of changes to the programme and on the process for assessing such impact. Informs project management of major technical issues and makes recommendations on their resolution. nsures that all changes are managed effectively, and contributes to formal reviews and evaluations when projects and programmes end. Manages the storage and backup systems to provide agreed service levels. Leads the creation, improvement, and support of quality digital services with optimal utilisation of storage resources, ensuring data security, availability and integrity of business data. nsures that the impact of defects and problems is evaluated. Verifies defect and problem clearance audit trails. nsures accuracy of requisite data for use by those carrying out analyses and ensuing actions. rafts standards, procedures & guidelines for implementing data protection and disaster recovery functionality for all business applications and business data using online and offline storage devices. Carries out full impact analysis of new software releases and recommends upgrade plans. Reviews upgrades and fixes available from system software suppliers and identifies those which merit action. Investigates potential and actual service problems and recommends solutions. evelops and uses formal procedures to plan and test proposed solutions. evelops and uses procedures for collection of critical information in the event of system software failure. Analyses documentation, storage dumps and logs relating to system software failures to identify the failing component. Isolates failures and recommends actions to circumvent problems and enable the restoration of services with the 2

3 minimum of business impact. Liaises with suppliers to obtain corrective code, installing and testing the code to ensure a permanent resolution. nsures that operational documentation for relevant system software products is fit for purpose and current. Provides advice and guidance to systems development and service delivery staff on the correct and effective use of system software. Monitors system efficiency against published service level agreements. Monitors both resource usage and failure rates of installed systems and provides detailed feedback to management. Gathers performance statistics from the IT platforms to enable recommendations for the tuning of system software. Tailors system software parameters to maximise throughput and efficiency. Advises management of significant developments with regard to existing and emerging system software. Plans projected software requirements and provides technical advice when needed by other teams. Can offer guidance in hiring professional team members. Co-ordinates and manages rapid response and permanent resolution to problems, ensuring that appropriate action is taken to investigate and resolve them, with minimal downtime to systems and services. Maintains up to date information on major problem resolution and ensures the communication of such information to all interested parties. nsures that problems are fully documented within the configuration management, incident management, defect/problem reporting system (known error database). Proactively matches unresolved incidents against existing problems, known errors and other incidents. Co-ordinates investigations and proposals for changes and circumventions. Initiates and monitors the implementation of agreed remedies, in close liaison with the help desk, incident management, change management, configuration management and asset management functions. etermines and initiates preventative measures, such as identifying and investigating suspect software and other components. nsures that existing problems and known errors in systems and services being brought into operation are understood and managed in the same way as those arising from operational incidents. Support service level management in monitoring the impact of problems on agreed service levels, and co-ordinate and manage any appropriate improvement actions. Analyses incidents and problems to show trends, correlation and potential problem areas, so that actions can be taken to minimise the occurrence of incidents and to improve the process of problem reporting, analysis and resolution. Creates and monitors plans and strategies to investigate and resolve incidents and problems, including proactive problem management activities. Assesses the probable causes of incidents and consequences of existing problems and known defects, in order to improve established problem management policy. Understand and advise on the risks of certain architectures and data management and mitigate against them. With an understanding of the various capabilities of different hosting environments and architectural set-ups, make appropriate design decisions for their implementation Build architectures incorporating data protection, such as the protection of physical and virtual environments, disaster recovery and fast recovery of data. Provision, build and deploy SaaS, IaaS, and PaaS environments. Set up a shared sandbox testing environment as part of the deployment pipeline, ensuring that everyone working on the product design, development or maintenance has a clear, easily accessible place to review the latest version of the software. Undertake load testing, simulating certain types of enial of Service attacks, including istributed enial of Service attacks, to ensure sites and applications work under realistic load (traffic) conditions. 3

4 Carry out service capability reviews to ensure they are meeting key performance indicators such as performance, availability. Motivates, leads and manage all direct line reports and other staff where required allocating responsibilities, work planning and managing performance. Provides general guidance, coaching and support, developing their skills, knowledge and understanding. Carries out regular appraisals, setting objectives, giving feedback and ensuring that targets are met. Variation to Job escription Staffordshire University reserves the right to vary the duties and responsibilities of its employees within the general conditions of the Scheme of pay and conditions and employment related matters. Thus, it must be appreciated that the duties and responsibilities outlined above may be altered as the changing needs of the service may require. Conditions of Service The post is subject to such terms and conditions of employment as negotiated between the Board of Governors of the University and the recognised trade unions, and/or the employees of the University. In negotiating such terms and conditions the Board of Governors will consider any appropriate advice received from the Universities and Colleges mployers Association (UCA). Informal iscussion Should you wish to discuss this vacancy informally before making an application please contact: mily Hampson Application Procedure We encourage you to apply on-line at our website as the system is user friendly and simple to complete. We would ask all applicants to ensure that they have provided comprehensive information under each criteria in the Supporting Statements section of the application form and, if necessary, add any relevant additional information in the Additional Information Section. 4

5 Person Specification Job Title: School/Service: Infrastructure Architect (S17/ITR1i) igital Services The qualifications, experience, knowledge skills and personal qualities outlined below provide a summary of what is required to carry out this job effectively. They also form the selection criteria on which a decision to appoint will be made. Please ensure that you provide evidence of how you meet the criteria in your application. No Selection Criteria escription ssential [] or esirable [] Assessed By * 1 Infrastructure Architecture. Understanding of the frameworks and principles of Cloud technologies, Systems Management, Identity Management, networking, databases, data storage and strategy. 2 Infrastructure Configuration. Knowledge, understanding and experience of infrastructure configurations Microsoft Azure Cloud, physical and virtual servers, SANs, HA/clustering, resilience, geo redundancy, automation scripts, dynamic allocation policies, number of processors, memory and storage allocations. 3 Operational/Service Architecture xtensive knowledge and understanding of current architectural principles, industry standards and best practices that the University should be adhering to in order to deliver robust and reliable business systems. Ability to reduce IT costs to deliver value and contribute to forecasting expenditure for budget planning. 4 Architecture - Capacity management. An understanding of capacity management, especially when designing flexible and scalable solutions whilst adhering to standard operating budgets. 5 Operations ngineering - Hosting and Cloud. Understanding of fundamental elements of hosting and cloud technologies, including: design, planning; security and compliance; integration; provisioning; cloud storage; virtualisation. 6 Operations Management. An understanding of the methods, techniques and tools for planning, organising, resourcing, directing, coordinating and monitoring ongoing (non project) activities to meet required service levels 7 Conceptual Thinking. Understanding of the underlying issues in complex problems or situations by correctly relating these to simpler or better understood concepts, models or previous experiences. 8 Customer Focus. Self-motivated, well organised and positive approach to work with the ability to manage and prioritise a complex workload and experience of dealing with challenging and demanding customers; whilst understanding the needs of the internal or external customer needs/requirements and regularly checking with the customer when taking actions or making decisions. 5

6 9 Interpersonal, written and verbal communication skills: xcellent interpersonal, written and verbal communication skills with the ability to translate often complex information into easy to understand messages for a range of audiences. 10 Team Work: ffective and committed team leader and team player able to work successfully with others and to build positive working relationships 11 Business Continuity Planning. An understanding and experience of the methods and techniques for risk management, business impact analysis, countermeasures and contingency arrangements relating to the serious disruption of digital services 12 Configuration Management. An understanding of digital asset control through the maintenance of information about the "configuration items", including hardware devices, programs, software licences, documentation and digital facilities. 13 IT Technologies Knowledge and experience in any of the following areas. Microsoft Azure, Windows Server Operating Systems, Red Hat Operating Systems, VMware, PowerShell scripting, SQL, Oracle, StorSimple, System Centre Operations Manager, Microsoft Licensing models for education, monitoring and optimisation, storage and data strategy, disaster recovery and application lifecycle management. MCS Cloud Platform & Infrastructure 14 ITIL Capability Module - Operational Support & Analysis (Intermediate) BCS - Chartered IT Professional (CITP) A Or equivalent qualification or experience *Key [A] Application form [I] Interview To be assessed against the information provided in the relevant steps of the application form and the evidence required under Section 4, Supporting Statements To be assessed during the interview process including selection tests or presentation, as appropriate 6