POSITION SUMMARYThe Cloud Architect provides technical leadership for our hybrid, multi-cloud estate-spanning on-premises private cloud and public cloud platforms in Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services. This role owns the reference architecture for infrastructure, drives platform automation and reliability, and partners with product, security, and operations teams to deliver secure, cost-effective, and resilient infrastructure foundations.
The ideal / preferred location for this role is on-site in Appleton, WI. May consider candidates in the Midwest (with some travel required to Appleton) based on relevancy of experience.
JOB RESPONSIBILITIESArchitecture, Design & Delivery- Translate reference architectures into detailed designs and implementation plans for landing zones, networking, and IAM.
- Engineer scalable platforms with high availability and performance aligned to business SLOs and DR requirements.
- Create golden images/templates and secure baselines for repeatable deployments.
Automation, CI/CD & GitOps- Build robust Terraform modules; integrate validation, testing, and security scanning into pipelines.
- Implement GitOps (Bitbucket pipelines) workflows where appropriate; improve release reliability and rollback safety.
- Guide teams on branching strategies and code review standards.
Reliability & Operations- Lead complex incident response, perform post-incident reviews, and drive preventive engineering.
- Establish capacity planning and performance testing practices for critical services.
- Evolve runbooks to reduce MTTR and increase operational readiness.
Security, Compliance & FinOps- Implement Zero Trust principles; design RBAC models and service identities; integrate secrets management.
- Codify and enforce guardrails via policy-as-code; ensure auditability and remediation workflows.
- Collaborate on cost governance (tagging, budgets, alerts) and drive optimization initiatives.
Collaboration & Leadership- Mentor Engineer I and II teammates; conduct design and code reviews and provide constructive feedback.
- Partner with Security, Networking, App, and Data teams; influence roadmaps and standards.
- Contribute to vendor/tool evaluations and present recommendations with tradeoffs.
Primary Tools & Technologies- Cloud: Azure, GCP; on-prem virtualization/storage (VMware, SAN/NAS).
- IaC/Config: Terraform, Ansible/Chef; Git; Bitbucket; CI/CD (Azure DevOps/GitHub Actions).
- Containers: Docker, Kubernetes (AKS/GKE); registries; ingress; basic service mesh.
- Observability: Azure Monitor, GCP Cloud Monitoring/Logging, Elastic.
- Security: Entra ID/Azure AD, GCP IAM; Key Vault/Secret Manager; KMS; policy-as-code.
Additional Job Responsibilities:- Live our values of High Performance, Caring Relationships, Strategic Foresight, and Entrepreneurial Spirit
- Find A Better Way by championing continuous improvement and quality control efforts to identify opportunities to innovate and improve efficiency, accuracy, and standardization
- Continuously learn and develop self professionally
- Support corporate efforts for safety, government compliance, and all other company policies & procedures
- Perform other related duties as required and assigned
QUALIFICATIONSRequired:
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field-or equivalent experience.
- Progressive IT experience with 7+ years focused on cloud architecture/engineering.
- Expertise in Terraform and/or Bicep; strong scripting (PowerShell or Python) and automation mindset.
- Solid networking (VNet/VPC design, DNS, VPN/ExpressRoute/Interconnect, load balancers, firewalls) and IAM.
- Production experience with containers and Kubernetes (AKS/GKE).
- Observability design and SRE practices; proven incident leadership and post-mortem facilitation.
- CI/CD pipeline design (Azure DevOps/GitHub Actions) with testing, security scanning, and policy gates.
- Excellent communication, stakeholder management, problem-solving, and mentoring skills.
- Ability to participate in an on-call rotation and support planned maintenance during off-hours.
Preferred:
- Certifications: Azure Solutions Architect Expert or Azure Administrator + Azure Security Engineer; Google Professional Cloud Architect or Professional DevOps; Terraform Associate; CKA/CKAD.
- Experience with Packer, service mesh/Ingress, and secrets management at scale.
- Background applying policy-as-code (Azure Policy, Org Policy, OPA) and compliance frameworks; FinOps experience.
DIVISION:
IGEN
U.S. Venture will not offer sponsorship for employment status (including, but not limited to, H-1B, TN, E-3, F1, CPT, OPT, STEM OPT, visa status and other employment-based nonimmigrant visas) for this position. Accordingly, all applicants must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis and must not require U.S. Venture's sponsorship to continue to work legally in the United States. In general, U.S. Venture does not sponsor candidates for nonimmigrant visas or permanent residency except when there is a specific business need.U.S. Venture will not accept unsolicited resumes from recruiters or employment agencies. In the absence of an executed recruitment Master Service Agreement, there will be no obligation to any referral compensation or recruiter fee. In the event a recruiter or agency submits a resume or candidate without an agreement, U.S. Venture shall reserve the right to pursue and hire those candidate(s) without any financial obligation to the recruiter or agency. Any unsolicited resumes, including those submitted to hiring managers, shall be deemed the property of U.S. Venture.U.S. Venture, Inc. is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to inclusion and diversity. We ensure equal opportunity for all applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, marital status, age, national origin, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or other protected characteristic. If you need assistance or an accommodation due to a disability, you may call Human Resources at (920) 739-6101.91-00-911-0000
