Why do you need to choose between doing important work and having a fulfilling life? At Ardent, we have both. Ardent employees are committed to solving our customers’ most difficult problems—and we are committed to the well-being, personal goals, and professional development of our employee. We are “All In.” We put forth our strongest effort possible to get the mission accomplished and we do it together. We respect the skills and experience you bring to the Ardent team. And we provide a rewarding environment to help you succeed. 

We offer highly competitive benefits, professional development opportunities, and an exceptional culture that embraces flexibility, innovation, collaboration, and career growth. A collective service mindset underpins our work, and a shared camaraderie to serve clients, colleagues and our communities set us apart. Our full commitment to being "All In" for our employees and our clients is not just our approach, it is our standard. If this sounds like the perfect fit for you, choose Ardent and make a difference with us. 

Ardent is seeking a Cloud Architect Lead to join our team.  

This is a Remote/Hybrid position located in the Washington, D.C. area.

Position Description:

Ardent is seeking a Cloud Architect Lead. We are seeking a highly skilled and experienced Cloud Architect Lead to take overall responsibility for engineering tasks related to cloud-based solutions. The Cloud Architect Lead will play a pivotal role in designing, implementing, and optimizing Cloud-based AWS solutions, as well as providing support for DevSecOps pipeline development, performance monitoring/configuration, and migration between cloud environments. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience in Enterprise IT environments and must achieve required certifications within three months after contract award.

Responsibilities and Duties:

• Lead the engineering tasks related to cloud-based solutions, with a focus on AWS.
• Design, implement, and optimize Cloud-based AWS solutions to meet business requirements.
• Apply The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF) in Agile solution designs to minimize technical debt and improve overall velocity.
• Design and develop software, systems operations/management, database architecture, storage, and IT security solutions.
• Utilize DevSecOps pipeline tools for configuration management, requirements management (e.g., JIRA), automated testing, and deployment.
• Ensure compliance with Federal Information Management Security Act (FISMA) and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Security Standards and Security Requirements.
• Design and develop Message Services, such as Apache ActiveMQ services, MuleSoft, and/or Apache Camel.
• Implement microservices/container architectures (e.g., OpenShift, Kubernetes), orchestration, and automation.
• Develop root cause analysis, problem identification and resolution, and roadmap for problems within system design and implementation of existing and new systems.
• Optimize system performance and resource utilization through log and monitoring analysis.
• Utilize Application Performance Monitoring (APM) tools, such as AppDynamics and/or NewRelic.
• Design and implement Cloud-based hosting solutions, as well as Cloud-based backup and recovery, including failover zones.
• Implement best practices in billing and accounting with AWS to minimize oversubscription of services.

Requirements: 

• Bachelor's degree with eight (8) or more years of relevant experience in an Enterprise IT environment.
• AWS Certified Solutions Architect Professional or AWS Certified DevOps Engineer Professional.
• Technical proficiency designing and implementing Cloud-based AWS solutions.
• Experience applying The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF) in Agile solution designs.
• Proficiency in network communication protocols, ports, routing, proxy settings, and firewall policies.
• Experience with microservices/container architectures (e.g., OpenShift, Kubernetes), orchestration, and automation.
• Proven ability to develop root cause analysis, problem identification and resolution.
• Technical proficiency in optimizing system performance and resource utilization.
• Familiarity with best practices in billing and accounting with AWS.

Due to the nature of the work we support, all candidates in consideration for this role must be U.S. Citizens willing to undergo the government issued background investigation process.

Ardent is an equal opportunity employer. We will not discriminate and will take affirmative action measures to ensure against discrimination in employment, recruitment, advertisements for employment, compensation, termination, upgrading, promotions, and other conditions of employment against any employee or job applicant on the bases of race, color, gender, national origin, age, religion, creed, disability, veteran's status, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.