Principal Systems Engineer

Pay:

$140,000 Role Who this person is and what they own The Principal Systems Engineer is the technical backbone of the organization's IT infrastructure. This individual designs, implements, and sustains the systems, networks, and platforms that every team depends on translating business needs into reliable, secure, and scalable technology solutions. Position in Org Reports to IT Manager or Director of Infrastructure. Works cross-functionally with other departments and business units. Scope Owns system lifecycle from architecture and deployment through monitoring, optimization, and decommissioning. Authority Makes decisions on system configurations, technology stack choices, and incident response within defined guardrails. Responsibilities What this person does day-to-day Design & Architecture Design scalable IT systems, servers, networks, storage, virtualization aligned with organizational goals and security standards. Implementation Deploy and configure hardware, software, and cloud services. Ensure smooth rollouts with minimal disruption to operations. Monitoring & Maintenance Proactively monitor system health and performance. Apply patches, updates, and tuning to prevent issues before they escalate. Security & Compliance Integrate security best practices into all system designs. Ensure compliance with relevant policies, standards, and regulations. Incident Response Lead triage and resolution of system incidents. Conduct root cause analysis and document findings to prevent recurrence. Documentation Maintain accurate records of configurations, changes, runbooks, and system inventories for operational continuity. Results What success looks like measurable outcomes Success in this role is defined by the reliability, efficiency, and security of systems under this engineer's stewardship. Uptime Target

• 99.9%
• System availability SLA Incident MTTR
• < 1hrs
• Mean time to resolve Change Success
• 95%+
• Zero-defect deployments Patch Coverage
• 100%
• Critical patches within SLA Qualitative Results Expected Systems scale predictably with business growth, no surprise capacity crunches Security vulnerabilities are identified and remediated before they become incidents Runbooks and documentation are maintained so another engineer can operate systems in the owner's absence Cross-functional teams trust IT infrastructure as an enabler, not a bottleneck System costs are actively optimized, license consolidation, right-sizing, and cloud efficiency Requirements What it takes to succeed in this role

EDUCATION & EXPERIENCE

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field, or equivalent work experience 3-7 years of hands-on systems engineering or IT infrastructure experience Demonstrated experience designing and supporting enterprise-grade infrastructure environments

TECHNICAL SKILLS

Windows Server / Linux VMware / Hyper-V AWS / Azure / GCP Active Directory TCP/IP Networking

DNS / DHCP / VPN

PowerShell / Bash Backup & DR ITSM / Ticketing Security Hardening Docker / Kubernetes

SOFT SKILLS & BEHAVIORS

Root-cause thinking Clear communicator Works under pressure Self-directed learner Collaborative Detail-oriented Ownership mindset Equal Opportunity Employer This employer is required to notify all applicants of their rights pursuant to federal employment laws. For further information, please review the Know Your Rights notice from the Department of Labor.