Systems Engineer
Chicago, IL

Job Description

Systems Engineer

Position Purpose

Reporting to the Sr. Manager of Systems Engineering, the IT Systems Engineer, will work on a team to support data center and cloud infrastructure. This individual will have a breadth of knowledge across multiple areas and will be proficient with a multiple of IT disciplines. These areas include server hardware and software both Windows and Linux, network infrastructure, virtualization/cloud computing, storage middle tier applications (Elastic Search, RabbitMQ, Kafka). You will need to learn and support Echo's complex propriety applications, understanding what they do and how they work together. Success in this role requires technical knowledge and experience, organizational skills and an eagerness to do whatever it takes to get the job done effectively and efficiently while continually challenging and improving the status quo.

Essential Position Functions

Principal Accountability | Support

* Maintain hardware and software, including servers, and related software.
* Act as an escalation path for Service Desk for advance troubleshooting, problem resolution and root cause analysis for production and test environment.
* Assess trending metrics to ensure efficient and effective use to maximize company's use of technology.
* Implement and support of new technology based upon various versions of Windows Server operating systems, Linux, Hardware and Software Technology Solutions and management, monitoring tools
* Schedule and perform system maintenance to maximize the efficiency of IT efforts
* Maintain and improve the Virtualization infrastructure including High Availability Solutions and Disaster Recovery on all compute, network and storage infrastructures
* Overall management, support & development of the existing Active Directory Services (ADS), Fundamental understanding of Core Active Directory roles and features such as DNS, DHCP, Group Policy Management and all associated ADS functions
* Maintains a healthy infrastructure by evaluating performance issues including availability, utilization, throughput, and scalability
* Troubleshoot and resolve deployment issues
* Creating and managing VMs
* Managing AWS cloud solutions
* Knowledge with VMWare and the vRealize suite
* Troubleshooting application errors for QA and above (e.g. Kafka, Zookeeper, Consul, RabbitMQ)
* Maintain load balancers
* Ability to thrive in an environment that requires frequent attention shifts from the system environment to the PC environment.
* Proactive, self-starter able to work with limited supervision and prepared to take responsibility for the role's operations.
* Exceptional time and project management skills.
* Improve efficiencies of redundant tasks by writing scripts and when possible schedule automation

Principal Accountability | Projects

* Architect, build, execute, and analyze proof-of-concept projects
* Document project plans
* Prioritize multiple projects and operational support
* Follow through with projects to their completion
* Coordinates and works on multiple cross-functional initiatives and projects
* Participates in short and long-term project efforts with stakeholders and IT groups
* Responsible for the creation and maintenance of technical documentation to ensure it is updated and current

Principal Accountability | Team Member

* Open to new ideas and encourages innovative practices amongst peers
* Practices positive interactions - leans on encouragement in place of judgment.
* Impresses responsibility on others by displaying ownership in tasks.
* Acts in the interest of the overall team.
* Actively works on broadening or adding skills
* Provides assistance to team when problems become challenging
* Balances best practice decisions with delivering high business value
* Contributes to the success of the team
* Able to multi-task in a fast paced, fluid work environment
* Capable of presenting technical ideas and concepts in business -friendly language
* Possess ability and willingness to learn as well as mentor more junior teammates
* Possess ability to communicate with other technologists, management, and business stakeholders

Position Requirements

* Undergraduate Degree in Computer Science or related technical discipline or equivalent years of experience
* Excellent oral and written communication skills including technical documentation skills
* Self-managed and motivated
* Ability to follow through with tasks to their completion, organized, and detail oriented
* Willingness to learn new technologies
* Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
* Ability to thrive in an environment that requires frequent attention shifts from one project to the next.
* Proactive, self-starter able to work with limited supervision and prepared to take responsibility for the role's operations.
* Exceptional time and project management skills.
* Overall IT experience in Data Center technologies
* Experience in IT Infrastructure implementation
* Experience with the Windows and Linux Server Environment is required
* Knowledge and experience supporting: Servers, Server Clustering and virtualization
* OS administration experience with Windows and Linux.
* Competency with infrastructure scripting
* Strong communicator able to effectively communicate technical information, both verbal and written, to a wide range of end-users (including non-technical audience) and IT teams
* Self-motivated with enthusiasm and ability to develop technical skills and take on additional responsibilities in order to add value to departmental and organizational mission and goals