Lead Microsoft Platform Administrator

Years of Experience: 15 years of experience, or 12 years with a Master’s degree

Education Requirements: Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Systems, Engineering, or related field

Program Description: The program provides end to end IT Infrastructure support services, including Tier 1 Help Desk, Tier 2 End User Support, Tier 3 Server, Platform, and Network Infrastructure Support and Engineering with responsibility for incident resolution, service requests, monitoring, lifecycle support, and escalation management.

Position Description: The Lead Microsoft Platform Administrator is the team lead for the platform team. The role is responsible for the administration, operation, and continuous improvement of the agency’s Microsoft Azure platform, Microsoft 365 and Exchange services, and on-premises and cloud-hosted Windows and Linux servers. This is a working lead role: the administrator performs hands-on Tier 3 engineering and also executes, delegates, tracks, and manages the team’s incidents, recurring operations and maintenance (O&M), and projects, including Azure DevOps (ADO) backlog management, sprint planning, and status reporting. The role works closely with architecture, cybersecurity, networking, and engineering teams to keep services aligned with enterprise standards.

Work Model: The platform team concurrently handles Tier 3 incidents, recurring O&M, and projects, and priorities may change daily. The lead sets the team’s priorities, reassigns work when urgent incidents arise, communicates resulting schedule impacts, and makes sure planned work resumes without losing ownership of existing commitments. Planned work such as maintenance and change windows may at times require shifting the schedule to work after hours, and the lead is called when a major issue occurs outside business hours.

Requirements

Team Leadership and Work Management

· Execute, delegate, and track the team’s work across incidents, O&M, and projects; assign work by skill and capacity, and rebalance assignments when priorities change.

· Plan and manage the team’s work in ADO: maintain the backlog, break projects and recurring work into tasks, run sprint planning, and track sprint progress to completion.

· Maintain a current view of team workload and status in ServiceNow and ADO, and report regularly on progress, risks, and schedule impacts to program management and government stakeholders.

· Review team members’ change requests, ticket documentation, and runbooks before submission or closure.

· Plan coverage for leave and after-hours change windows so that each platform function has a trained backup.

· Mentor and develop team members, including cross-training to reduce single points of knowledge.

· Serve as the team’s escalation point for technical decisions and priority conflicts.

Azure Platform Engineering and Administration

· Lead and support administration of Azure environments, including subscriptions, resource groups, landing zones, governance and tagging, virtual machines, storage accounts, and platform services.

· Implement and maintain Azure networking, including Network Security Groups, Azure Firewall, Application Gateways, VPN connectivity, private endpoints, and hybrid network integration.

· Build automation and infrastructure as code using PowerShell, Azure Automation, Logic Apps, ARM templates, Bicep, or Terraform.

· Monitor platform health using Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, Application Insights, and Microsoft Defender.

· Maintain backup, disaster recovery, and high availability using Azure Backup and Azure Site Recovery.

· Advise project and application teams on adopting Azure services, and recommend performance, cost, and security improvements through architecture reviews.

Identity, Microsoft 365, and Exchange

· Lead and support administration of Microsoft Entra ID, hybrid identity, Conditional Access, Privileged Identity Management (PIM), and role-based access control (RBAC).

· Lead and support administration of Microsoft 365 services and Exchange (Online and on-premises).

Server Administration, Patching, and Security

· Lead and support administration of on-premises and Azure-hosted Windows and Linux servers, including builds, configuration, and lifecycle maintenance.

· Plan and oversee server patching using Microsoft Configuration Manager (MCM) and other approved tools.

· Make sure security hardening and vulnerability remediation meet agency security requirements, NIST controls, and federal cloud security standards.

Tier 3 Incident Support

· Own the team’s Tier 3 incidents from assignment to closure, whether worked directly or assigned to a team member.

· Lead troubleshooting of complex and cross-team Azure, identity, Microsoft 365, Exchange, and server issues.

· Escalate to Microsoft or other vendors with a complete case record, and identify recurring incidents for permanent fixes through problem management.

· Participate in and manage the team’s on-call rotation.

Operations and Change Management

· Make sure the team’s recurring O&M tasks are completed on schedule and recorded in ServiceNow.

· Follow the NCUA change management process and hold the team to it.

Projects

· Lead platform projects from planning through closeout, including scope, milestones and dependencies, stakeholder agreement, phased implementation, and user communications.

· Support cloud migration projects for servers, applications, databases, and hybrid workloads.

Communication and Documentation

· Communicate directly with end users, government stakeholders, and contract counterparts: explain issues and impact in plain language, set expectations on timelines, and confirm outcomes.

· Make sure ticket notes and work logs are written in ServiceNow as work happens, so another engineer can pick up the issue without re-contacting the user.

· Maintain platform documentation, including runbooks, SOPs, knowledge articles, and architecture diagrams, and update it after incidents, changes, and projects.

Required Skills:

· 15+ years of Microsoft infrastructure administration and engineering experience, or 12+ years with a Master’s degree, including 5+ years leading technical teams, with direct responsibility for assigning, tracking, and reviewing the work of other engineers.

· 5+ years of hands-on Azure administration and engineering.

· Strong experience with:

o Microsoft Azure (networking, virtual machines, storage, Backup and Site Recovery)

o Microsoft Entra ID and hybrid Active Directory

o Microsoft 365 and Exchange (Online and on-premises)

o Windows Server and Linux server administration

o PowerShell automation

o Microsoft Configuration Manager (MCM)

· Experience administering controls that support Zero Trust, such as Conditional Access and PIM.

· Experience planning and tracking team work in Azure DevOps or a similar agile tool, including backlog management, sprint planning, and status reporting.

· Demonstrated experience resolving Tier 3 incidents in a ticketed (ITSM) environment, following a formal change management process, and delivering IT projects through closeout.

· Experience working directly with end users and government or customer stakeholders, verbally and in writing.

· Ability to maintain a Public Trust security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications:

· Microsoft certifications: Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104), Azure Solutions Architect Expert (AZ-305), or Identity and Access Administrator Associate (SC-300)

· ITIL Foundation certification (ITIL 4 or Version 5) or equivalent IT service management training

· Experience with ServiceNow, NinjaOne, and Datadog

· Prior experience supporting a federal agency

Benefits

SES provides a competitive salary and the following benefits:

• Medical
• Dental
• Vision
• AD&D
• STD
• LTD
• Company paid Life Insurance
• 401k with employer contribution
• Paid Time Off
• Pet Insurance