Lead Platform Architect - Infrastructure; OpenShift - NESO

About the Role

National Energy System Operator’s (NESO) strength lies in our people. Together, we’re shaping the future where clean, affordable energy is accessible for all. Every day is an opportunity to make a real difference, accelerating the progress of sustainable GB energy, keeping people connected and society thriving as we create a brighter tomorrow.

We are seeking a highly skilled and experienced Lead Platform Architect to further build upon existing design and maintain the robust and scalable network and infrastructure architecture for our Open Shift platform
. This is a critical role that shapes foundation of our application delivery, ensuring high availability, performance, and security for all products and services hosted on the platform.

As a Platform Architect, you will work with our network and infrastructure providers to structure layout of on‑premises Open Shift platform.

This role can be based in Warwick or Wokingham, and we continue to offer hybrid working from office and home. We are open to full time and part time applicants, as well as flexible working arrangements.

• Architectural Design: Lead the design of the end-to-end infrastructure and network architecture for our Open Shift platform, including networking, storage, compute, and security components.
• Open Shift Expertise: Serve as the subject matter expert on Open Shift infrastructure and networking, including OVN-Kubernetes, Open vSwitch, SDN, and various CNI plugins.
• Network Strategy: Define and implement the network topology and security policies for the Open Shift cluster and its hosted applications, including ingress/egress routing, load balancing, and firewall rules.
• Security and Compliance: Design and enforce security best practices within the infrastructure and network layers, ensuring compliance with industry standards and internal policies. This includes implementing network segmentation, micro‑segmentation, and zero‑trust principles.
• Performance and Scalability: Optimize the infrastructure and network for performance and scalability, ensuring the platform can handle increasing workloads and traffic.
• Automation: Drive the automation of infrastructure provisioning, configuration, and management using Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools such as Terraform, Ansible, and Git Ops workflows.
• Troubleshooting: Act as the escalation point for complex infrastructure and network issues, providing expert‑level troubleshooting and root cause analysis.
• Collaboration: Work closely with Open Shift platform engineers, application development teams, security teams, and operations teams to ensure seamless integration and alignment of architectural goals.
• Mentorship: Mentor and guide junior engineers, sharing knowledge and fostering a culture of technical excellence.
• Roadmap and Innovation: Stay abreast of emerging technologies and industry trends in cloud‑native networking and infrastructure, and contribute to the long‑term strategic roadmap for the platform.

• Proven experience in a senior infrastructure or network architecture role, with a strong focus on cloud‑native platforms.
• Deep expertise in Red Hat Open Shift
  , including its core components and underlying infrastructure.
• Extensive experience with Kubernetes networking concepts (CNI, Services, Ingress, Network Policies).
• Solid understanding of network protocols and technologies (TCP/IP, DNS, BGP, VPNs, firewalls).
• Hands‑on experience with public cloud providers (e.g., AWS, Azure, GCP) and their networking services.
• Proficiency in Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools like Terraform or Cloud Formation.
• Experience with configuration management tools like Ansible.
• Strong scripting skills (e.g., Python, Bash).
• Excellent problem‑solving, communication, and collaboration skills.

• Microservices Architecture: Experience designing and implementing network and infrastructure solutions for microservices‑based applications. This includes knowledge of service mesh technologies (e.g., Istio, Linkerd) and API gateways.
• Red Hat Technologies: Experience with other Red Hat technologies such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform, Red…