Description

How to Apply

A cover letter and resume are essential to help the hiring team understand your experience. In your cover letter, please explain how this role aligns with your career aspirations and skill set. The cover letter should be submitted as the first page of your resume. Submit both the cover letter and the resume in a single file.
 
What You'll Do

The Center for Academic Innovation is seeking an Infrastructure Architect Senior to design and operate the platform infrastructure that supports Michigan Online and CAI's digital learning ecosystem. Reporting to the Director of Technology Infrastructure and Support, you will drive the infrastructure roadmap, cloud architecture, operational reliability, and Tier 2 service model. This is a hands-on technical management role with formal responsibility for supervising infrastructure engineers, including performance management, coaching, and delivery accountability. You will also build the systems, standards, and operational practices that enable scalable, secure, and reliable learning for a global audience.
Who We Are

About the Center for Academic Innovation

Through curricular innovation, tools for student success, and educational research and analytics, the University of Michigan Center for Academic Innovation is building the future of education. Our vision is a future in which education connects and empowers learners everywhere to reach their full potential throughout their lives. To realize our vision, we make it our mission to collaborate across campus and around the world to create equitable, lifelong educational opportunities for learners everywhere.

About the Technology Infrastructure and Support Team

The TIS team builds and maintains the robust technology foundation that enables innovation at the Center for Academic Innovation. We ensure the reliability, scalability, and security of the CAI's media, IT, and learning infrastructure, supporting everything from studio production and XR experiences to course platforms and internal systems. Our work spans Michigan Online infrastructure, AV systems design, IT support, media asset management, cloud storage, cybersecurity, and disaster recovery planning. We collaborate closely with Creative Studios, Operations, and product engineering teams to deliver seamless technical experiences for learners, faculty, and staff. Whether designing resilient workflows, managing cross-functional support models, or piloting next-generation tools, the TIS team plays a critical role in advancing CAI's mission at scale.

For more information, please visit our website: Academic Innovation.

Responsibilities*

Infrastructure & Cloud Architecture

• Lead the Michigan Online and CAI cloud infrastructure roadmap, including hands-on ownership of production AWS environments supporting customer-facing platforms at scale.
• Architect and evolve a cloud-native, auto-scaling infrastructure capable of supporting millions of global learners. Champion the shift toward immutability and self-healing systems.
• Design, implement, and operate platform-wide observability and monitoring systems (e.g., metrics, logging, tracing) for production services, including alerting, incident response, and post-incident remediation.
• Define and maintain standards for authentication, authorization, and API integrations.

Operational & Service Management

• Design and implement the Tier 2 incident and service management model, including SLAs, escalation paths, and operational readiness.
• Lead modernization of ticketing workflows across CAI technical teams, ensuring clear ownership, prioritization, and transparency.

Systems, Storage & Resilience

• Oversee enterprise storage, archival infrastructure, and data lifecycle management.
• Partner on cloud security, backup, disaster recovery, and resilience planning, including readiness and testing.
• Support capacity planning and cost-aware infrastructure decisions.

Team Leadership & Collaboration

• Lead and manage an infrastructure team, providing technical direction, coaching, and performance oversight while remaining hands-on in architecture, escalation, and reliability engineering.
• Serve as Infrastructure Squad Lead, accountable for roadmap execution and operational outcomes.
• Partner closely with TIS, DevOps, Data, and Learning Experience Designers to align infrastructure capabilities with platform and learning needs.
• Coordinate with ITS and external vendors on integrations, cloud services, and platform support

Modes of Work

Positions that are eligible for hybrid or mobile/remote work mode are at the discretion of the hiring department. Work agreements are reviewed annually at a minimum and are subject to change at any time, and for any reason, throughout the course of employment. Learn more about the work modes.

The work requirements allow both onsite and offsite work and an employee has an expected recurring onsite presence. On occasion, the employee may be required and must be available to work onsite more frequently if necessitated by unit leadership or their designee and/or the job requirements.
 
Additional Information

Candidates must have legal authorization to work in the United States.

The mode of work for this position is Hybrid with a minimum of 4 days in the office per week, Monday through Thursday, with an option of remote work on Fridays. On occasion, you may be required to work on-site on Fridays, as mandated by our center's policy and domain leadership, or by your job requirements.

The salary for this position will be based on the selected candidate's education and experience.

Excellent benefits are available. For details, see http://benefits.umich.edu/

Organizational Statement on Harassment

We believe all individuals deserve to be treated with respect and dignity and have the right to work in a professional atmosphere that promotes mutual respect and a safe space for collaboration. Any concerns shared with any staff members and student employees in the Center for Academic Innovation will be reported to the Equity, Civil Rights, & Title IX Office to be reviewed and addressed, and the Center for Academic Innovation encourages reporting of any forms of harassment, including sexual and gender-based harassment.

Salary Information

The general salary range for this position is $100,000 to $110,000. Candidates can expect to receive a competitive, equitable salary. Factors used to determine salary include education level, experience, knowledge, and skills for the position, as well as current salaries within the unit. All candidates are encouraged to discuss salary questions to honor alignment and transparency throughout the recruiting process
Background Screening

The University of Michigan conducts background checks on all job candidates upon acceptance of a contingent offer and may use a third-party administrator to do so. Background checks will be performed in compliance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act.
Application Deadline

Job openings are posted for a minimum of seven calendar days. The review and selection process may begin as early as the eighth day after posting. This opening may be removed from posting boards and filled anytime after the minimum posting period has ended.
Decision Making Process

Applications will be reviewed as received throughout the posting period and will continue until the position is filled.
 
U-M EEO Statement

The University of Michigan is an equal employment opportunity employer.

Requirements

Required Qualifications*

•     Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Computer Engineering, or a related field
•     7+ years of experience in infrastructure, platform engineering, or site reliability roles supporting production systems.
•     3+ years of experience formally managing infrastructure or platform engineering staff, including performance reviews, delivery accountability, and staff development.
•     Demonstrated experience leading an infrastructure or platform team with formal responsibility for roadmap execution, backlog prioritization, and operational outcomes.
•     Hands-on experience owning and operating containerized platforms (Kubernetes and/or OpenShift) in production environments, including deployment, scaling, reliability, and lifecycle management.
•     Strong working knowledge of cloud infrastructure (AWS preferred), including networking, identity, and cost considerations.
•     Proven ownership of production reliability, including monitoring, incident response, and continuous improvement.
•     Experience with infrastructure automation and standardization (e.g., infrastructure as code, reusable patterns, self-service enablement).
•     Practical experience partnering with security and identity teams to operationalize non-functional requirements (access control, vulnerability remediation, audit readiness).
•     Familiarity with hybrid environments (cloud and on-prem) and their operational tradeoffs.
•     Experience working in product-oriented or agile operating models, where infrastructure is delivered as a reusable platform.
•     Strong communication skills, with the ability to translate technical risks and tradeoffs for non-technical stakeholders.
•     Commitment to documentation, knowledge transfer, and building sustainable operating practices.