Senior IT Architect - Linux

The University of Texas at Austin; Austin (TX); Hybrid; USD 117,000 - 143,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health benefits

Flexible work options

Tuition assistance

Paid time off

Job summary

The University of Texas at Austin is seeking a Senior IT Architect - Linux to lead the design, governance, and implementation of the university’s Linux endpoint management platform. You will drive alignment across stakeholders and guide transition to an enterprise service.

Responsibilities include architecture for configuration, deployment, patching, and compliance, plus collaboration with security and campus IT teams to standardize Linux management across diverse environments.

Qualifications

• Advanced Linux knowledge across multiple distributions (RHEL, Ubuntu, Debian, etc.).
• Experience with enterprise Linux management and automation tooling.
• Strong scripting ability (Bash, Python, PowerShell).
• Ability to design and implement a centralized Linux platform and governance.

Responsibilities

• Lead design and implementation of a central Linux management platform.
• Develop onboarding plans for departments to centralize Linux systems.
• Create automation for provisioning, patching, and compliance reporting.
• Collaborate with security to align Linux management with policy requirements.

Skills

Linux expertise

Scripting/Automation

DevOps practices

Platform architecture

Stakeholder communication

Tools

Tanium

Chef

Puppet

Ansible

Red Hat Satellite

Job description

Job Posting Title: Senior IT Architect - Linux ---- Hiring Department: Enterprise Technology - Customer Support ---- Position Open To: All Applicants ---- Weekly Scheduled Hours: 40 ---- FLSA Status: Exempt from FLSA ---- Earliest Start Date: Jan 04, 2027 ---- Position Duration: Expected to Continue Until Dec 31, 2029 ---- Location: AUSTIN, TX ---- Job Details: General Notes This fixed-term position is funded for two years from the employee’s start date and may be extended. Flexible work arrangements are available for this position, including the ability to work remotely within the United States. Remote work for individuals who reside outside Texas but within the United States and its territories will be considered and requires Central Office approval. May require occasional travel to Austin Main Campus. This position provides life/work balance with typically a 40-hour work week and travel limited to training (e.g., conferences/courses). Enterprise Technology is dedicated to supporting the mission of the University of Texas at Austin of unlocking potential and preparing future leaders of the state. Your skills will make a difference. You’ll be working for a university that is internationally recognized for research and the work you do will make a difference in the lives of our students, faculty and staff. If you’re the type of person that wants to know your work has meaning and impact, you’ll like working for our campus. The University of Texas at Austin and Enterprise Technology provide an outstanding benefits package to our staff. Those benefits include:

• Competitive health benefits (Employee premiums covered at 100%, family premiums at 50%)
• Vision, Dental, Life, and Disability insurance options
• Paid vacation, sick leave, and holidays
• Teachers Retirement System of Texas (a defined benefit retirement plan)
• Additional Voluntary Retirement Programs: Tax Sheltered Annuity 403(b) and a Deferred Compensation program 457(b)
• Flexible spending account options for medical and childcare expenses
• Training and conference opportunities
• Tuition assistance
• Athletic ticket discounts
• Access to UT Austin's libraries and museums
• Free rides on all UT Shuttle and Capital metro buses with staff ID card

For more details, please see: https://hr.utexas.edu/prospective/benefits and https://hr.utexas.edu/current/services/my-total-rewards Must be authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis for any employer without sponsorship. This position requires you to maintain internet service and a mobile phone with voice and data plans to be used when required for work.

Purpose

The Enterprise Linux Management Program requires a dedicated Senior Technology Architect to provide strategic leadership for the design, governance, and implementation of the university's Linux endpoint management platform. The position will ensure alignment across stakeholders, guide complex technical decisions, and provide the leadership needed to transition from fragmented Linux management practices to a sustainable enterprise service.

Responsibilities

Enterprise Linux Platform Architecture

• Lead the design, build, and continuous improvement of a central Linux management platform supporting diverse research, academic, and administrative environments.
• Develop platform architecture for configuration management, software deployment, patching, compliance, and reporting.
• Evaluate and implement enterprise Linux management platforms such as Tanium, RHEL, or comparable platforms.
• Create platform standards that are scalable, secure, and effective across heterogeneous Linux distributions.

Distributed IT Onboarding and Adoption

• Work directly with distributed IT teams to assess existing Linux environments, operational maturity, management gaps, and onboarding readiness.
• Develop onboarding plans to help departments transition Linux systems into a central platform.
• Create guides, onboarding checklists and documentation for campus IT teams.
• Consult with system administrators, endpoint teams, cloud teams, and application owners on platform adoption and service integration.
• Identify opportunities to consolidate redundant tooling, reduce operational fragmentation, and improve consistency across departmental Linux management practices.

Automation, Configuration, and Compliance

• Design and maintain automation frameworks for provisioning, configuration enforcement, policy compliance, patching, reporting, and system lifecycle activities.
• Develop reusable scripts, modules, playbooks, policies, or configuration baselines using Bash, Python, or comparable technologies.
• Implement practices that support drift detection, remediation workflows, auditable change, and repeatable operations.
• Partner with information security teams to align Linux management with institutional security requirements, vulnerability management, and compliance objectives.

Linux Platform Operations and Engineering

• Provide advanced Linux engineering guidance across RHEL, Ubuntu, or comparable enterprise distributions.
• Support platform operations across physical, virtual, containerized, and cloud-hosted Linux systems.
• Develop operational standards for patching, software distribution, access control, monitoring, logging, and service health.
• Troubleshoot complex technical issues involving Linux systems, automation frameworks, management agents, network dependencies, storage, identity, or cloud integrations.

Reporting, Metrics, and Service Visibility

• Design reporting that provide visibility into Linux inventory, platform adoption, compliance posture, vulnerability exposure, and platform health.
• Develop executive and operational dashboards that communicate service value, onboarding progress, risk reduction, and platform maturity.
• Define measures and key performance indicators for platform adoption, service quality, compliance, and operational effectiveness.
• Use metrics to identify improvement opportunities, prioritize remediation efforts, and guide long-term Linux service strategy.

Cloud and Hybrid Infrastructure Alignment

• Support a Linux platform across on-premises and hybrid infrastructure environments.
• Develop management patterns for cloud-hosted Linux servers, container platforms, and infrastructure-as-code workflows.
• Provide guidance on operational consistency, logging, patching, and compliance, across cloud and campus-hosted systems.
• Partner with infrastructure teams to align Linux platform services with enterprise cloud architecture standards.

Strategic Service Leadership

• Participate in technology roadmaps, service design, and long-term infrastructure planning.
• Mentor technical staff and provide leadership on Linux management, automation, reporting, and operational best practices.
• Communicate technical recommendations clearly to technical staff, managers, service owners, and institutional stakeholders.
• Help build an adoption-focused service model that encourages participation from distributed IT organizations and demonstrates measurable institutional value.
• Perform other related functions as assigned.

Required Qualifications

• Technical Expertise
• Advanced expertise with Linux operating systems including Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Ubuntu, Debian, Rocky Linux, or comparable distributions.
• Experience with enterprise Linux management, configuration management, endpoint management, automation, or systems management platforms such as Tanium, Chef, Puppet, Ansible, Salt, Red Hat Satellite, or comparable tools.
• Advanced scripting and automation experience using Bash, Python, PowerShell, infrastructure-as-code tools, or comparable technologies.
• Experience with software deployment, patch management, configuration baselines, and compliance reporting for Linux systems.
• Experience designing or integrating monitoring, logging, observability, dashboarding, and operational reporting solutions.
• Experience with AWS and Azure infrastructure services, hybrid cloud operations, or cloud-hosted Linux management patterns.
• Strong understanding of enterprise networking, identity, authentication, security, storage, virtualization, and containerization concepts.
• Experience with source control, DevOps practices, documentation, and repeatable operational workflows.
• Professional Skills Ability to consult with distributed IT teams and guide technical onboarding.
• Ability to translate platform capabilities into practical adoption plans, standards, and operational procedures.
• Strong analytical, troubleshooting, and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to communicate technical concepts to system administrators, managers, service owners, and non-technical stakeholders.
• Ability to balance standardization with legitimate local requirements in a federated or decentralized IT environment.
• U.S. Citizen, resident, or officially recognized asylee - Applicant selected will be subject to government security investigation and must meet eligibility requirements for access to classified information at the level appropriate to the project requirements of the position.
• Equivalent combination of relevant education and experience may be substituted as appropriate.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in higher education, research computing, public-sector IT, or similarly distributed technology environments.
• Experience onboarding decentralized organizations into centralized or shared IT service platforms.
• Experience implementing service consolidation, technology standardization, or platform adoption initiatives across multiple units.
• Experience operating Linux management platforms at enterprise scale.
• Experience with observability tools such as Splunk, Graylog, Prometheus, Grafana, Nagios, Netdata, or comparable platforms.
• Experience with virtualization, Kubernetes, container platforms, infrastructure-as-code, or cloud-native operations.

Salary Range

$130,000 + depending on qualifications

Working Conditions

May work around standard office conditions Repetitive use of a keyboard at a workstation Use of manual dexterity Work Shift Monday – Friday, 8am-5pm; May require occasional overtime nights and/or weekends

Required Materials

Resume/CV 3 work references with their contact information; at least one reference should be from a supervisor Letter of interest Important for applicants who are NOT current university employees or contingent workers: You will be prompted to submit your resume the first time you apply, then you will be provided an option to upload a new Resume for subsequent applications. Any additional Required Materials (letter of interest, references, etc.) will be uploaded in the Application Questions section; you will be able to multi-select additional files. Before submitting your online job application, ensure that ALL Required Materials have been uploaded. Once your job application has been submitted, you cannot make changes. Important for Current university employees and contingent workers: As a current university employee or contingent worker, you MUST apply within Workday by searching for Find UT Jobs. If you are a current University employee, log-in to Workday, navigate to your Worker Profile, click the Career link in the left hand navigation menu and then update the sections in your Professional Profile before you apply. This information will be pulled in to your application. The application is one page and you will be prompted to upload your resume. In addition, you must respond to the application questions presented to upload any additional Required Materials (letter of interest, references, etc.) that were noted above.

Employment Eligibility

Regular staff who have been employed in their current position for the last six continuous months are eligible for openings being recruited for through University-Wide or Open Recruiting, to include both promotional opportunities and lateral transfers. Staff who are promotion/transfer eligible may apply for positions without supervisor approval.

Retirement Plan Eligibility

The retirement plan for this position is Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS), subject to the position being at least 20 hours per week and at least 135 days in length.

Background Checks

A criminal history background check will be required for finalist(s) under consideration for this position.

Equal Opportunity Employer

The University of Texas at Austin, as an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions.

Pay Transparency

The University of Texas at Austin will not discharge or in any other manner discriminate against employees or applicants because they have inquired about, discussed, or disclosed their own pay or the pay of another employee or applicant. However, employees who have access to the compensation information of other employees or applicants as a part of their essential job functions cannot disclose the pay of other employees or applicants to individuals who do not otherwise have access to compensation information, unless the disclosure is (a) in response to a formal complaint or charge, (b) in furtherance of an investigation, proceeding, hearing, or action, including an investigation conducted by the employer, or (c) consistent with the contractor’s legal duty to furnish information.

Employment Eligibility Verification

If hired, you will be required to complete the federal Employment Eligibility Verification I-9 form. You will be required to present acceptable and original documents to prove your identity and authorization to work in the United States. Documents need to be presented no later than the third day of employment. Failure to do so will result in loss of employment at the university.

E-Verify

The University of Texas at Austin use E-Verify to check the work authorization of all new hires effective May 2015. The university’s company ID number for purposes of E-Verify is 854197. For more information about E-Verify, please see the following: E-Verify Poster (English and Spanish) [PDF] Right to Work Poster (English) [PDF] Right to Work Poster (Spanish) [PDF]

Compliance

Employees may be required to report violations of law under Title IX and the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Crime Statistics Act (Clery Act). If this position is identified a Campus Security Authority (Clery Act), you will be notified and provided resources for reporting. Responsible employees under Title IX are defined and outlined in HOP-3031. The Clery Act requires all prospective employees be notified of the availability of the Annual Security and Fire Safety report. You may access the most recent report here or obtain a copy at University Compliance Services, 1616 Guadalupe Street, UTA 2.206, Austin, Texas 78701.

Start Here, Change the World At The University of Texas at Austin, tradition meets innovation in the heart of a city that frequents lists of the best places to live and work. Named by Forbes as one of America's Best Large Employers for the sixth year in a row in 2025, UT offers both a dynamic work environment and a gateway to vibrant local culture. Whether you're at the forefront of the student experience, conducting world-changing research or supporting the engine that drives Texas’ flagship university, working at UT means making a lasting impact on our city, our state and our world. Our more than 20,000 faculty and staff empower 55,000+ students to challenge ideas, pursue passions and shape their futures. Joining UT, you’ll become part of a community dedicated to making a meaningful impact on campus and throughout the world.

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Comments and Inquiries: Email comments to [e-mail]. For questions or concerns regarding equal opportunity only, contact Equal Opportunity Services. Additional information for applicants can be found on the Human Resources web page: Applying for Employment. For more job information, call the Human Resource Service Center at [phone], or toll-free at [phone]. UT Austin is a Tobacco-free Campus