Principal Engineer

Job Title: Principal Engineer for IT Ops
Location: Chicago

Job Summary: A Principal Engineer for IT Ops at Advantage Solutions is a senior-level position who is comfortable dealing with high level activities and drive execution. High level tasks include making high-level design choices and framing technical standards, including tools, software coding standards, and platforms to be used. Execution activities range from helping with team mobilization, defining solution architecture, leading design review or testing plan and being engaged in support activities. This role requires broad and deep technical knowledge to make high-level decisions about each stage of the IT operations lifecycle process. Additionally, the Principal Engineer must possess strong soft skills to manage and positively influence projects and people.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Collaborate with various stakeholders to determine an IT operations’ architecture strategy aligned with Advantage Solutions’ business objectives.
• Create high-level solutions specifications and design documents (conceptual and physical diagrams).
• Provide the IT operations team with architectural blueprints to follow.
• Ensure the security of all IT systems in alignment with our Security strategy.
• Meet financial objectives by forecasting requirements, preparing budgets, scheduling expenditures, analyzing variances, and initiating corrective actions.
• Actively seek ways to improve business IT processes and interactions.
• Enhance cloud, network, DevSecOps and operation capabilities.
• Work closely with lead architects and engineers to create and maintain architectural templates, build/operational documents, and automation playbooks.
• Work closely with engineers and product owners to deliver IT or business capabilities.

Secondary Responsibilities:

• Research and properly evaluate sources of information to determine possible limitations in reliability or usability.
• Help other development and engineering teams resolve application-to-platform integration issues for Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) services.
• Maintain domain knowledge by participating in educational opportunities, reading professional publications, and participating in professional organizations.
• Coach and mentor engineering teams to raise collective technical expertise.
• Test the final product to ensure it is entirely functional and meets requirements.
• Use a proactive approach to common challenges and continually research best practices in coding.

Qualifications / Skills / Requirements:

• Outstanding collaboration and communication skills are essential.
• 5+ years of experience working on large-scale IT projects.
• 5+ years of exposure to cloud-managed services, serverless technology, and microservices like Function-as-a-Service, Containers, and managed databases.
• 5+ years of exposure to logging and application performance monitoring.
• 5+ years of experience overseeing customized development of processes for multiple projects simultaneously.
• 5+ years of exposure with database architecture and infrastructure.
• 3+ years of exposure with network design.
• Demonstrated deep knowledge of web applications, API development, cybersecurity, and open-source technologies.
• Demonstrated track record of leading within complex organizations requiring strong influence management skills - the ability to work cooperatively at all levels in a matrix environment.
• Proven ability to create high-level product specifications and design documents.
• Experience in enhancing cloud capability by creating and implementing cloud application patterns.
• Ability to forecast requirements, prepare budgets, schedule expenditures, analyze variances, and initiate corrective actions.
• Strong problem-solving skills and a proactive approach to common challenges.
• Continuous learning mindset, with the ability to stay updated on industry trends and best practices.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related field.
• Certifications in cloud technologies such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud.
• Certifications in ServiceNow.
• Experience with DevOps practices and tools such as Jenkins, Docker, Kubernetes, and Terraform.
• Familiarity with ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) processes and practices.
• Experience with automation and orchestration tools.
• Knowledge of data analytics and machine learning.
• Experience in a leadership role within a large enterprise environment.

Strong understanding of regulatory and compliance requirements in IT operations.

Job Will Remain Open Until Filled