Lead Virtualization Engineer

About Us

Founded in 1996, FlexTrade Systems is the global leader in high performance, multi asset order and execution management solutions.

FlexTrade introduced the first trading system that enabled clients to control and customize their proprietary algorithms while maintaining the confidentiality of their trading strategies via a vendor-provided, broker-neutral platform. Our worldwide client base spans more than 175 buy- and sell-side institutions, including investment banks, hedge funds, asset managers, commodity trading advisors and institutional brokers. Located in London, with offices in New York, North America, and Asia, FlexTrade maintains an experienced staff of developers, programmers, strategists, and product specialists, who work together with our clients' technologists and traders to break new ground in the field of electronic trading. We offer competitive salaries, bonuses, and a comprehensive benefits package.

The Team

We are actively seeking experienced candidates to lead our Global Virtualization and Infrastructure team that supports FlexTrade’s Global infrastructure hosting operations. As a financial services technology vendor that delivers mission critical Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) to our clients, FlexTrade’s Infrastructure Operations is vital to our business and foundational to customer success. You will be a vital asset to the leadership of FlexTrade’s IT Operations, who play an integral role in the business, keeping our revenue generating SaaS environment free from downtime. This ensures we can deliver a high level of service to our diverse set of clients, including large asset managers, hedge funds, banks and brokers which in turn maintains FlexTrade's reputation as a market leader in Electronic Trading space. This presents an exciting challenge for the Global Infrastructure Lead. The Virtualization Infrastructure Lead will oversee a global team of 3+ members. This role will report to the Head of Global Infrastructure (based in Great Neck, NY).

About You

The successful applicant will have experience in leading small teams as well as hands on knowledge of running and maintaining a SaaS hosting environment. This position is responsible for ensuring effective delivery of services and successful delivery of key infrastructure and network projects through both team management and direct contribution. This position will also be a key enabler driving collaboration with IT Infrastructure Operations Teams based in AMS and APAC.

The Job

As Virtualization Infrastructure Lead for a global infrastructure team, you will be responsible for managing a team of infrastructure engineers. The team is part of a global IT organization and will drive virtualization and infrastructure reliability and ensure that the most critical outages to our business, guest, & team members has prompt recovery, and effective communication to stakeholders. Core Responsibilities of this job are described within this job description. Job duties may change at any time due to business needs.

Requirements

• Provide strategic direction and oversight for the design, development, operation, and support of IT systems to deliver FlexTrade’s solutions.
• Manage the full end to end technology life cycle within the infrastructure space
• Ensure effective service delivery and management through timely project delivery and working closely with our Hosting Operations team to support ticket-based work
• Work projects and ticket escalations as needed to ensure successful delivery of services and projects. Manage and take part (if needed) in rota and on-call coverage for the running of the FlexTrade environment.
• Manage, escalate, and analyze incidents and problems for the production environment, assessing patterns, making recommendations, and providing appropriate communication.
• Work with other support groups (e.g., development, client services) to define workflows and update standard operating procedures. Follows industry best practices where appropriate.
• Provide leadership, coaching and direction to the local team, coordinate with the wider, global, infrastructure teams and foster a business-oriented culture and mindset.
• Working with the global team to identify critical infrastructure projects and advise on emerging technologies to ensure IT capabilities respond to the needs of FlexTrade’s business strategy.
• Engage with existing or prospective clients in EMEA seeking to evaluate or develop a better understanding of FlexTrade’s application hosting environment

Knowledge, Skills & Experience

• Minimum of eight (8) years of Engineering work experience
• Minimum of six (6) years of experience in Network troubleshooting in a 24x7 Operations Center
• Minimum of two (2) years of direct management experience
• Ability to supervise and motivate others
• Ability to work with others to resolve problems, handle requests or situations
• Proven experience of Infrastructure design and implementation
• Deep understanding of current and emerging infrastructure technologies and how other enterprises are employing them.
• Team leadership and management experience
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to explain technical concepts and technologies to business leaders, and business concepts to the infrastructure operations team.
• Experience in managing data centre environments including installations, patching, lifecycle management, capacity management, process automation, orchestration etc.
• ITIL certification and/or technical certifications in any of the above technologies’ desirable
• Understanding of infrastructure stack, including
• Physical Infrastructure Stack - Compute, Storage, Networking (e.g., Cisco)
• Virtualization (e.g., VMWare)
• Linux/Windows OS
• Network Connectivity (VPLS, VPN, Leased Lines, Cross Connects)
• Familiarity with emerging technologies including
• Cloud Technologies incl Private/Hybrid Cloud (AWS, Azure, VMC)
• Continuous Integration/Development (Jenkins)
• Containerization (Docker, Kubernetes)
• Monitoring Technologies
• Ability to drive organizational change and build infrastructure capabilities that effectively optimize operational efficiency and deliver innovative and agile solutions.
• The ability to plan and script complex changes within the Network infrastructure.
• Patching & upgrade management of devices
• Participates in change control committee, providing input into all changes/additions to network to ensure minimal disruption to production system.
• Strong vendor management and partner relation skills.

Education & Qualifications

• Bachelor's or master's degree in computer science, information systems, or related field, or equivalent work experience.
• 8+ years of relevant experience
• ITIL certification and/or technical certifications in any of the above technologies’ desirable

FlexTrade is renowned for our high performance, open architecture systems that surpass our competition by providing our clients with a highly tailored trading experience. Engineering at FlexTrade is technologically exciting, inspiring and challenging. Engineers have the opportunity to be creative top tier contributors in every area and within every development stage. Our unique office culture creates an environment where engineers can thrive and grow their careers.

**FlexTrade Systems, Inc. does not accept unsolicited resumes from search firm recruiters. Fees will not be paid in the event a candidate submitted by a recruiter without an authorized agreement for a particular SOW (Statement of Work) in place is hired: such resumes are deemed the sole property of FlexTrade Systems, Inc.**

**FlexTrade Systems, Inc. is an equal opportunity employer and makes employment decisions without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or any other status protected by law.*