Tier 3 System Administrator Lead

Ardent; Washington; On-site; USD 120,000 - 170,000; Full time

Job summary

Ardent in Washington, DC is seeking a Tier 3 System Administrator Lead to support the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) and its critical infrastructure. The role focuses on end-to-end operational integrity, availability, maintenance, and recovery of the Museum's server ecosystem, with on-site operations to enable 24x7x365 escalation.

You will lead administration of Windows and Linux servers, VMware, AWS, and AD, while automating tasks with shell scripts and coordinating changes

Qualifications

• Experience maintaining operational integrity across on-prem, virtual, and cloud servers.
• Expertise in Linux and Windows server administration and shell scripting.
• Ability to troubleshoot server hardware, OS, virtualization, storage, backups, and identity services.
• Experience with VMware, Windows Server, Linux, AWS, AD, DNS, SSL certs, patching and monitoring practices.
• Ability to document work, coordinate changes with stakeholders, and lead vendor escalation.
• Willingness to support on-site work and participate in 24x7x365 after-hours escalation.

Responsibilities

• Lead administration, monitoring, maintenance, troubleshooting, and recovery for Windows and Linux servers.
• Patch OS, monitor storage, perform backups, renew SSL certificates, firmware updates, and remediation.
• Administer VMware ESXi/vCenter, AWS EC2 and related services, SQL/MySQL/Oracle, AD, DNS infrastructure.
• Automate repeatable tasks using shell scripting to accelerate diagnosis and recovery.
• Support AWS operations including EC2 lifecycle, S3, Route 53, VPC, Lambda, CloudWatch, IAM.
• Deploy physical/virtual/cloud servers; complete domain joins, DNS/IP registration, security baselines, and asset tagging.
• Operate backup and recovery platforms, conduct DR exercises, and verify runbooks.
• Provide Tier 3 escalation and after-hours support for critical infrastructure.

Skills

Linux server administration

Windows server administration

Shell scripting

VMware vCenter/ESXi

AWS cloud services

Active Directory

DNS administration

Backup & disaster recovery

Storage & backup platforms

Documentation & change management

Tools

VMware vCenter

PowerScale

OneFS

Cohesity

Dell Unity

SolarWinds

AWS CloudWatch

Job description

Ardent is seeking a Tier 3 System Administrator Lead to join our team.

This is an on-site position in Washington, D.C.

Position Description:

Ardent is seeking a Tier 3 System Administrator Lead to support the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) and the technology foundation behind its historically important mission.. Reliable systems, storage, backup, and cloud services are essential to the Museum’s work preserving Holocaust history, supporting education, and serving the public. The Tier 3 System Administrator Lead willbe responsible for the end-to-end operational integrity, availability, maintenance, and recovery of the Museum’s server ecosystem. The position supports onsite operations to enable 24x7x365 enterprise escalation requirements.

Responsibilities and Duties:

• Lead administration, monitoring, maintenance, troubleshooting, and recovery for physical, virtual, and cloud-based Windows and Linux servers.
• Perform operating system patching, storage-capacity monitoring, hardware maintenance, critical-service restart and validation, backup verification, SSL certificate renewal, firmware and BIOS updates, and directed vulnerability remediation.
• Administer and troubleshoot VMware ESXi and vCenter environments, AWS EC2 and related cloud services, Microsoft SQL, MySQL, Oracle, certificate services, and Active Directory infrastructure within the assigned operational scope.
• Use advanced Linux and Windows administration skills, including shell scripting, to automate repeatable support activities and accelerate diagnosis and recovery.
• Support AWS operations including Linux EC2 lifecycle management, S3 administration, Route 53 records, VPC routing, Lambda monitoring, CloudWatch monitoring, and approved IAM execution.
• Deploy physical, virtual, and cloud servers; complete domain joins, IP and DNS registration, security baselines, backup policy association, documentation, and asset tagging.
• Operate backup, restore, and recovery services using Museum-supported platforms, including daily job review, restoration requests, annual disaster recovery exercises, bare-metal recovery, and runbook validation.
• Support storage platforms and services, including PowerScale, OneFS, Cohesity, S3, Glacier, Unity, and associated monitoring, access, capacity, firmware, and recovery activities.
• Provide data center hardware support, vendor RMA coordination, equipment and cable labeling, environmental and rack-capacity monitoring, and approved physical changes.
• Serve as technical lead for third-party hosted applications, vendor updates, secure remote access, certificates, domains, OS patching, and application-tier services such as IIS, Apache, or JBoss.
• Create and maintain accurate implementation, configuration, recovery, change, incident, and operational documentation; coordinate significant changes through Museum change-control processes.
• Provide Tier 3 escalation and after-hours support for incidents affecting critical infrastructure, including data center and AWS services.

Requirements:

• Expertise in Linux and Windows server administration and shell scripting.
• Demonstrated experience maintaining operational integrity across on-premises, virtual, and cloud-based server environments.
• Advanced troubleshooting experience with server hardware, operating systems, virtualization, storage, backup, databases, identity services, and network dependencies.
• Experience with VMware, Microsoft Windows Server, Linux, AWS, Active Directory, DNS, SSL certificates, and enterprise patching and monitoring practices.
• Experience executing backup, restoration, disaster recovery, bare-metal recovery, and hardware failure remediation activities.
• Ability to document technical work, coordinate changes with technical stakeholders, and lead vendor escalation and restoration efforts.
• Ability to support onsite work and participate in 24x7x365 after-hours escalation for critical incidents.

Preferred Qualifications:

• AWS SysOps Administrator-level proficiency or a relevant AWS certification.
• Experience with PowerScale, OneFS, Cohesity, Dell Unity, VMware vCenter, AWS S3 and Glacier, CloudWatch, and SolarWinds.
• Experience supporting SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, IIS, Apache, or JBoss environments.

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

Ardent is an equal opportunity employer. We will not discriminate 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, gender expression, or any other basis protected by state, local, or federal law.