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Job Specification
Position Title: SENIOR ADVISOR - UNIX
Job Code: OPSEU - Systems Officer 6, 17162
Job ID: 22295

Purpose of Position:
To provide highly specialized technical leadership and co-ordination for ITSs most complex midrange systems administration activities and projects which support 24/7/365 operations. To provide authoritative, specialized systems administration technical expertise and leadership, and recommend related solutions, systems management tools and options, to enhance the managed server hosting service capability of providing OPS technical solutions, server availability, customer web content quality and customer data access

Duties/Responsibilities:
1. Provides highly specialized support for assigned technical aspects of systems administration, including, for example:
- server infrastructure support assistance for the server build kit,
- performing build integration,
- implementing and managing back-up and the SAN infrastructure.

2. Provides highly specialized broad systems administration technical leadership, expertise and reporting, for example: developing and finalising policies and procedures for management approval (eg: for SANs; scripts to provide maintenance and automation of labour intensive tasks); providing work status reports, analyzes and technical recommendations, and installing new tools as required for operation efficiency and productivity; developing specifications for the tendering process; participating in selecting and negotiating with vendors to develop contracts and SLAs; managing vendors performance, alerting management to defaults, recommending and implementing solutions; developing and delivering technical education programs for clients and work teams; providing technical mentoring for all systems administration staff, including identifying technical strengths and weaknesses and advising them and management of areas for improvement. Contributes authoritative technical expertise to systems administration planning, evaluation and budgeting. Ensures that recommendations are congruent with overall work goals and corporate directions. For example: participates in business systems/service needs identification and definition activities with management and clients; researches and evaluates options, identifies costs and benefits, and makes persuasive recommendations to management; develops detailed specifications based upon client requirements, ensuring adherence to standards in support of new scope work.

3. Plans, resources, leads, co-ordinates, evaluates and reports on highly specialized technical aspects of systems administration work. Leads technical aspects of multiple concurrent or sequential projects, including planning, estimating resources, providing highly specialized technical guidance, co-ordination and instruction, monitoring progress and problem-solving, and reporting to management with recommendations. Projects cover any aspect of systems administration and include major activities such as: performing critical evaluations of the most complex systems and developing recommendations for improvement; managing technical change, installation, configuration, maintenance and tuning; troubleshooting by anticipating, identifying, diagnosing and resolving very serious incidents/problems; systems analysis and capacity planning; disaster planning and security.

4. Provides technical mentoring for assigned system administration staff, including guiding and instructing less experienced staff in server and system recovery activities, identifying staff technical strengths and weaknesses, and advising regarding areas to be improved.

5. Provides ongoing client service regarding highly specialized aspects of systems administration, and manages highly complex operational, technical and service aspects of stakeholder relations. Participates in helping users manage change resulting from systems administration decisions, and provides change-related, longer-term user support, including:
- dealing with exceptions from the rule, and functioning as an authoritative technical interface providing technical expertise and leadership to resolve situations for which there may be no precedent;
- leading, and/or developing and delivering technical education programs for clients and work teams
- planning and managing technical aspects of server upgrades (eg: CPU, Disk, memory, RAM etc); introducing and/or re-engineering business processes among the technical support groups as approved; analyzing, recommending and installing new tools for operational efficiency and productivity; leading the installation of tools to improve operational efficiency and productivity (eg: for system monitoring, backups, build kits, load testing tools, DNS auditing, sniffers, packet filtering, intrusion detection etc.); ensuring monitoring takes place as required (eg: monitoring CPU, memory, file system, system logs, web, application and data base servers), providing highly specialized statistical analysis and incident/problem reporting by problem type, and providing regular summary reports and highly specialized and ad hoc reports to the ITS Management Team with technical and procedural change recommendations;
- chairing incident/problem-solving meetings; analyzing all operational incidents affecting the production server farm and dedicated, fully managed server environments and service restoration, using interpretative reasoning to deal with specific incidents and problems referred by less experienced technical staff where situations may be very diverse and broad in scope; escalating root cause problems to the ITS Team Lead; providing all communications to the Team Lead on the escalation and mean time required to repair problems during service disruptions;
- ensuring that all systems backups and restores are completed as required;
- performing all highly complex change requests as assigned by the Change Coordinator for the production server farm and dedicated servers, and documenting/updating server run books; installing and configuring builds for new servers; providing guidance to Senior Analysts and Analysts in loading and testing client applications and 3rd party software; ensuring approved routine server hardware upgrades (eg: CPU, Disk, memory, RAM etc) are performed, and that current OS and 3rd party software patches are within the standard ITS server build, including ensuring that anti virus software patches are kept up to date on all servers and web instances;
- working closely with vendors as appropriate to resolve major/complex hardware and software failures.

6. Performs project, operational and service administration activities, (eg: scheduling and assigning work; monitoring costs, verifying that vendors deliverables have met completely contract requirements before Manager authorizes payment).

Management has the right to assign other duties.

Knowledge:
In order to provide expert, state-of-the-art technical systems administration services and support, and maintain service standards for all aspects of a wide variety of related technology, hardware and software, applied in mid-to-large size I&IT organisations; research, plan, lead and evaluate sophisticated and complex system administration activities; contribute related expertise and persuasive technical recommendations to activities and management decision-making; identify very serious change-related incidents and problems, and provide viable options and solutions where there may be no precedents; provide draft and finalised policies and procedures, the job requires knowledge of:
• operating systems (eg: NT/AIX/UNIX, Windows Server, SUN), system operations and system development in a medium to large 24/7/365 IS/IT organization, and system design and architecture techniques; (eg: MCSE/SUN [to equivalent of certification level]
• network software ; network products (eg: Cisco hubs, switches); network protocols and services, TCP/IP and IP addressing, DHCP, DNS, HTTP, FTP, DNS, LDAP); network concepts (eg: CISCO equipment and protocols); network design; IP networking; firewalls software (eg: Checkpoint and PIX); proxy software (eg: Entrust); antivirus software;
• Enterprise storage/backup and restore technologies (e.g. Symantec Netbackup, Command Central Service, Vaulting, Disaster Recovery testing and media management);
• scripting and servlets (eg: PERL, VB Script, XML, JAVA, ASP, EJB, J2EE);
• application support (eg: B2B and B2C);
• server technology (eg: Compact, IBM, SUN);
• Web, Internet, browser and email software (eg: Websphere, Web logic, IIS, MQseries, iPlanet, Netscape, Apache, indexing, web crawler software; clustering and active directory software; IE, Netscape; Sendmail);
• database concepts and software (eg: MS SQL, Oracle);
• system and services monitoring tools (eg: HP Openview, Tivoli, NetIQ, WUG);
• IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) processes, terms and definitions, in order to provide service support which consistently reaches approved standards through approved methods;
• Client needs and business environment to define technical scope of work with Sr Analyst or Manager; develop highly specialised technical RFP and SLA specifications.
• Situational, project, operational and service management skills, including costing and cost control for systems administration projects and services.
• Problem-solving techniques to provide leadership and solutions which deal efficiently and effectively with a very wide variety of highly specialized systems administration technical, operational and service problems (eg: trouble-shooting persistent problems arising from situations which may be very diverse and broad in scope).
• RFP and tendering process, contract management, to ensure own input is compliant with corporate standards and client needs.
• Customer service techniques to provide data, reports, problem resolution, education and information.
• Technical change management, training and education techniques.

Staffing and Licensing Requirements:
Prior to the offer of employment, in accordance with the OPS Personnel Screening Checks Policy, the top applicant(s) will be required to undergo personnel screening checks, which includes a police records check. This condition applies to all applicants.

Skills:
Job requires skills in:
• Reasoning, planning, analysing, interpreting and assessing to ensure that very complex systems administration needs are identified and solutions developed for systems administration problems which may have no precedent, /or which involve exceptions from the rule; technical work, operations and/or services are planned, scheduled, monitored and evaluated appropriately; and that cost-effective, viable innovative solutions are provided for management and clients.
• Judgement to make timely and appropriately researched and evaluated recommendations, including in situations where there may be no precedent; deal with exceptions from the rule; assign tasks; manage relationships.
• Team leadership to develop and encourage team work, good morale and high performance within cross-functional teams.
• Highly specialized technical expertise in using equipment and methodologies described in Knowledge Section for systems engineering and system administration.
• Trouble-shooting and problem management, combined with strong tolerance for ambiguity in order to analyze problems and determine root causes, deal with exceptions from the rule, and provide viable solutions for problems for which there may be no precedent.
• Written and oral communications to write, explain and present very complex technical reports and recommendations for decision-makers whose expertise may not be in systems administration; establish effective working relationships and provide instruction for less experienced team members; negotiate with vendors; instruct vendors; provide draft and finalised policies and procedures.
• Managing concurrent and very diverse projects and assignments for which there may be no precedent.
• Co-ordinating, consulting, guiding and managing working relationships (eg: with network administrators, application developers, vendors – eg: in providing problem resolution and root cause analysis after problems have been resolved).
• Using in initiative and ability to work alone or within a team environment.

Freedom of Action:
Job requires:
• Using judgement to translate broader goals and objectives into service, project or operational specifications within organisational policy.
• Initiating action and using judgement to work independently.
• Reasoning, planning, interpreting and analysing to find innovative solutions to solve specific difficult systems administration problems for which there may be no precedent, and deal with exceptions from the rule.
• Providing authoritative technical, operational and service expertise regarding systems administration, making persuasive recommendations and providing viable options (eg: at one or more of conceptual, identification, research, selection, analysis, design, configuration, testing, implementation, maintenance, operation, trouble-shooting, enhancement and/or modification, monitoring and evaluation phases); recommending appropriate technical resources for work including suitable project and staff team members; drafting and finalising policies and procedures.
• Using situational and project management skills, including: ensuring appropriate team leadership and co-ordination; ensuring provision of sound needs assessments, costing, resource estimation and deployment; developing project milestones and performance benchmarks for approval; evaluating approved technical aspects of work performance; developing and implementing remedies and improvements.
• Managing relationships and providing appropriate support to a wide variety of management stakeholders and clients.
• Communicating, educating and guiding peers, counterparts, team members, stakeholders and users.
• Participating in the RFP and tendering process (eg: developing comprehensive, very complex technical specifications, assisting in evaluating responses, participating in contract and Service Level Agreement [SLA] negotiations); managing vendors ongoing performance to ensure compliance with outsourced service contracts and SLAs.
Work is checked upon completion for compliance with business goals, Cluster, ITS and OPS policy and directions. Unprecedented problems or problems with far-reaching implications are referred to the Manger with complete technical recommendations for discussion and decision-making.