JOB TITLE
Solutions Architect, Infrastructure Services
LOCATION
Worcester
DEPARTMENT NAME
Infrastructure Services and Architecture
DIVISION NAME
Worcester Polytechnic Institute - WPI
JOB DESCRIPTION SUMMARY
The Solutions Architect, Infrastructure Services is a senior technical role that serves as a dedicated solution design resource within the infrastructure technology domain. The primary function of this position is to develop well-defined, standards-aligned infrastructure solution designs that support institutional projects, initiatives, and service evolution. This role functions to translate strategic intent and operational requirements into implementable architectures. This position reports to the Assistant Chief Technology Officer.
JOB DESCRIPTION
Responsibilities:
Solution design & architecture
1. Develop comprehensive solution design documents for infrastructure-led projects, translating business and operational requirements into technically sound, standards-aligned architectures.
2. Collaborate with Infrastructure Service Owners and Directors to capture technical requirements and constraints that shape solution designs.
3. Ensure designs account for scalability, performance, resilience, fault tolerance, security controls, and operational supportability.
4. Produce architecture artifacts including logical and physical design diagrams, component specifications, dependency maps, integration considerations, and implementation guidance.
5. Present solution designs to the architecture review board, incorporating feedback and resolving open issues prior to design approval.
6. Maintain solution design documentation throughout the project lifecycle, updating designs to reflect decisions, scope changes, or implementation realities.
Architecture documentation & standards
7. Document and maintain institutional infrastructure architecture, including current-state environment documentation, approved reference architectures, and design patterns for common scenarios.
8. Contribute to the development and refinement of infrastructure architecture standards and technical guardrails.
9. Produce architecture decision records (ADRs) capturing the rationale behind significant design decisions, evaluated alternatives, and identified trade-offs.
10. Develop and maintain a library of reusable reference architectures, design templates, and implementation guidelines that promote consistency and accelerate delivery.
11. Ensure documentation standards are applied consistently across all solution design and architecture artifacts to support auditability and future reference.
Architecture review board support
12. Support the evaluation of proposed infrastructure solutions for alignment with WPI architectural principles and institutional standards.
13. Assess submissions for technical soundness across networking, server and virtualization platforms, storage, endpoints, cloud infrastructure, and datacenter architecture.
14. Identify technical risks, design gaps, and areas of non-alignment; document findings clearly and provide actionable remediation guidance.
15. Engage submitters with technical questions and guidance to support a constructive review process — the goal is to help solutions succeed while maintaining appropriate standards.
16. Contribute to ongoing improvement of architecture review criteria, intake processes, and evaluation consistency.
Engineering partnership & implementation
17. Partner with infrastructure engineers across network, systems, storage, endpoints, cloud, and datacenter disciplines to translate approved designs into actionable implementation plans.
18. Resolve technical ambiguities and open design questions before and during engineering handoff to reduce implementation risk and rework.
19. Provide ongoing technical guidance during implementation to ensure engineering execution remains consistent with approved architectures.
20. Participate in implementation reviews and post-project retrospectives to validate design fidelity and capture lessons learned.
21. Work with the Infrastructure DevOps team to promote Infrastructure-as-Code adoption, standardized configuration management, and automated build and deployment practices.
Technical advisory & cross-functional support
22. Serve as a technical resource, providing architectural input on service strategies, platform decisions, and initiative planning.
23. Provide architectural guidance on endpoint management platforms, device lifecycle management, and endpoint security architecture.
24. Provide architectural guidance on network design, segmentation, secure remote access, wireless infrastructure, and network security controls.
25. Serve as the designated infrastructure technical resource on projects requiring infrastructure architectural expertise, contributing to planning, scope definition, and risk identification.
26. Support vendor and procurement evaluation processes by providing architectural assessments against institutional standards and principles.
27. Contribute to change advisory board processes by providing technical review of infrastructure changes to confirm alignment with approved architectures.
Requirements:
28. Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Information Systems, or a related technical discipline; or equivalent combination of education and demonstrated professional experience.
29. Minimum seven years of progressive experience in IT infrastructure.
30. Demonstrated breadth across multiple infrastructure domains with depth in at least two, such as networking, server and virtualization platforms, storage, cloud infrastructure, or endpoint management.
Salary Grade 10: $95,000 – $120,000 per year (depending on experience)
Salary is based on related experience, expertise, and internal equity; generally, new hires can expect pay between the minimum and midpoint of the range.
FLSA STATUS
United States of America (Exempt)
WPI is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified candidates will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, or disability. It seeks individuals from all backgrounds and experiences who will contribute to a culture of creativity, collaboration, inclusion, problem solving, innovation, high performance, and change making. It is committed to maintaining a campus environment free of harassment and discrimination.