What Does a Cloud Architect Do?
Technology professionals who design and manage cloud computing strategies for organizations are known as cloud architects. Their responsibility is to choose the right cloud services and infrastructure for their organization and ensure that these services meet the organization’s technical and business requirements.
In addition to planning and implementing the migration of existing applications and data to the cloud, the cloud architect also provides guidance on the security, scalability, and cost optimization of the cloud environment. Cloud architects often work on projects with other members of a technology team, including DevOps engineers and developers.
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National Average Salary
Cloud architect salaries vary by experience, industry, organization size, and geography. To explore salary ranges by local market, please visit our sister site zengig.com.
The average U.S. salary for a Cloud Architect is:
$141,050
Cloud Architect Job Descriptions
When it comes to recruiting a cloud architect, having the right job description can make a big difference. Here are some real world job descriptions you can use as templates for your next opening.
Example 1
[Your Company Name] is looking for a new cloud architect to join our IT team. As a cloud architect, you will be responsible for managing our cloud system architecture and models in order to ensure that it is functioning properly at all times. This may include creating a cloud computing strategy, evaluating and assessing cloud hardware, software, and systems in order to ensure they are functioning properly, and more. The ideal candidate should have previous experience working with IT security administrators and other members of the IT team to integrate the correct security, software, and data into the cloud system. A potential candidate should be data-minded, be able to research the latest cloud technologies available for cloud architecture and computing, and should have previous experience in the cloud architecture field. If this sounds like it might be the right job for you, we would love to have you on our team. A candidate who has a positive attitude and delivers high-quality work will be preferred.
Typical duties and responsibilities
- Create roadmaps based on the cloud’s capacity, efficiency and ecosystem security
- Create diagrams, domain models, and other types of software artifacts to decode a particular problem
- Collaborate with software programmers and engineers
- Lead and manage a cross-functioning technology team
- Monitor cloud activity, design and migrate applications, plan courses of action, and define computer loads
- Respond to technical issues in a professional and timely manner
Education and experience
This position requires a bachelor’s degree in computer science, information technology, applied mathematics, or a related field. Many employers prefer candidates who have a master’s or doctorate, and prior experience as an administrator or architect in any of the well-known operating systems.
Required skills and qualifications
- Lots of experience in computer scripting languages like Python, Ruby, and Elixir
- Excellent knowledge in current computing trends and technologies
- Ability to design and implement cloud infrastructure, platforms, and applications
- Exceptional leadership and people skills
- Strong verbal and written communication
- Experience in computer security, such as firewalls
- Expertise in at least one operating system: Linux, Unix, Solaris, Ubuntu, Windows
- Proficiency in networking: TCP/IP, IP addresses, HTTP, DNS
Preferred qualifications
- Requires 5+ years of experience designing server solutions for large corporations
- Ability to automate tasks by scripting
- Experience deploying systems into Cloud environments
- Knowledge of networks and networking
- Good communication and documentation skills
Example 2
As Cloud Architect, you’ll be responsible for overseeing the company’s cloud computing strategy. This includes cloud adoption plans, cloud management, and monitoring. You will oversee architecture and deployment in cloud environments, including public, private, and hybrid cloud. Additionally, you will act as consultant to the organization by continuously researching and studying the latest trends and issues. You will drive enterprise organizational alignment to ensure successful cloud adoption, security, governance, monitoring, and risk management is adhered to.
Your role:
- Design cloud environments with a focus on Azure and AWS and demonstrate technical cloud architectural knowledge, playing a vital role in the design of production, staging, QA, and development of cloud infrastructures running in 24×7 environments
- Implement and oversee all aspects of the cloud environment including provisioning, scale, monitoring, and security
- Delivery of cloud strategies, aligned with business objectives and with a focus on cloud migrations
- Provide leadership in infrastructure migration methodologies and techniques including mass application movements into the cloud including implementation of Azure or AWS within in global enterprise environments
- Nurture cloud computing expertise internally and externally to drive cloud adoption
- Act as key stakeholder for validation of new cloud or SaaS solutions adhere to architecture roadmap
- Implement required systems, solutions, and processes needed to manage cloud cost, monitoring, scalability, and redundancy are accounted for and continuously validated
- Ensure all cloud solutions adhere to security and compliance best practices
- Collaborate with Enterprise Architecture, Data Platform, DevOps, and Integration Teams to ensure cloud adoption follows standard best practices
What you bring:
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering or Information Technology or equivalent experience
- Relevant industry certifications such on Microsoft Azure or Amazon Web Services (AWS), AWS Certified Solution Architect or Microsoft MCSE: Cloud Platform and Infrastructure
- 10 or more years of IT experience
- Minimum of 5 years’ experience supporting cloud solutions
Preferred qualifications:
- Azure and AWS based cloud architecture and migration skills and experience
- Strong understanding across cloud and infrastructure components (server, storage, network, data, and applications) to deliver end to end cloud infrastructure, architectures, and designs
- Knowledge of additional cloud technologies such as GCP, VMware, API Management, and Identity Management
- Knowledge and implementation of enterprise scale cloud security platforms and tooling
- 5+ year’s experience as an IT Infrastructure Architect, with focus on AWS and Azure clouds, server, storage, and networking
- Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
- Understands and can articulate the technical merits and value of cloud computing.
- Passionate, persuasive, articulate cloud professional capable of quickly establishing interest and credibility in how to design, deploy and operate cloud-based architectures. Strong written, verbal, and chalk board skills
- Experience in enterprise applications, solutions, and data center infrastructures
- Ability to work with team members from around the globe/experience working with off-shore models
- Strong service attitude and a commitment to quality
Example 3
ABC Company is seeking a Cloud Architect for a premier global development team to create and evolve a robust cloud-based analytics platform. In this Cloud Architect position, you would be responsible for communicating with internal stakeholders to determine requirements, prototyping solution plans, and converting proof-of-concepts for the larger development teams.
Responsibilities for the cloud architect include:
- Create high-level product specifications and design documents
- Provide the development team with architectural blueprints to follow
- Collaborate with various stakeholders to determine software requirements
- Tests the final product to ensure it is completely functional and meets design requirements
- Troubleshoots and resolves issues with coding or design
- Presents regular progress reports and sets goals
Qualifications for the cloud architect include:
- Bachelor’s degree in a technical field
- 6+ years of software development experience
- Cloud experience, preferably Azure or AWS
- J2EE development background
- Distributed Computing with Hadoop
- ElasticSearch experience preferred
Example 4
As part of our team, you will:
- Develop service teams relating to competence and service excellence (process, tool, attitude) and delivery function in cooperation with other managers
- Provide direct and technical leadership to delivery teams and act as an escalation point for implementations performed by the team
- Continuously improve delivery quality and efficiency through automation and support initiatives in standardization across projects and automation
- Review with each team member on their performance, regular mentoring & coaching team members, follow-up on competence development
- Plan resources, participate in recruitment and induction programs, and maintain appropriate communication with all levels of organization
Your skills and experience:
- 4 years engineering or Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience required
- Hands-On Experience with various platform & product deployment and automation
- In-depth knowledge of Kubernetes, K8s administration, devops, Linux Administration, Networking, Openstack/VMware (Cloud Computing), Databases, and CI/CD
- Experience with Cloud Native Platforms including Kubernetes, Docker
- Experience in deploying application in one of cloud environments like Openshift/VMware Tanzu/Amazon AWS/Microsoft Azure/Google Cloud/VMware. Tanzu is a must
- 10+ years of experience and expertise in customer deployment and agile delivery models
- Knowledge of our commonly used tools/components/technologies in applications – Helm, Elastic search, Fluentd, Kibana, Grafana, Prometheus, Neo4j, Java, Istio, Calico, Cassandra, etc.
It would be nice if you also had:
- Exposure to Telecommunication Domain
- Application Skills: Database (Oracle/Mariadb/), Nginx/HTTP Server, API’s, Keycloak, Message queues, workflow Engines
- Experience with industry automation tools, like Ansible, Terraform, Chef, Puppet, Python, etc.
Candidate Certifications to Look For
- Professional Cloud Architect Certification. The Professional Cloud Architect certification is a certification test that is provided by the Google systems, meaning it will be recognized as an official certification for cloud architects to prove their experience and professional expertise with cloud systems. This certification can be beneficial to both beginner and more advanced cloud architects, as it proves that the certification candidate has the knowledge to plan and implement a cloud system, manage implementations of cloud architecture, and much more.
- CompTIA A+. Due to the nature of the CompTIA certification, this can be immensely beneficial to a cloud architect. Becoming certified through this testing process ensures a wide variety of technical knowledge relating to computer, network, and cloud systems. This certification is thought of as a general certification for almost any IT-related field and can prove to be immensely beneficial to a cloud architect.
How to Hire a Cloud Architect
There are a number of important initial considerations when hiring a cloud architect:
- Recruiting: Do you have the knowledge, tools, and resources to attract and screen candidates?
- Complexity: Do you need a senior professional, or will mid or junior-level skills and experience suffice?
- Duration: Are you hiring for a project or an ongoing need?
- Urgency: How soon does the opening need to be filled? What happens while it remains open?
- Headcount: Do you have the budget and approval for an internal employee, or should you consider alternate options?
Answering these questions will help determine the best course of action for your current hiring need. Fortunately, great options exist for every scenario. These are our recommendations:
1. Use 4 Corner Resources (or another professional recruiting firm)
The heavy lifting is done for you when working with a top-tier staffing company like 4 Corner Resources. We source, screen, recruit, and deliver only the most qualified candidate(s), saving you significant time and effort throughout the hiring process while you remain focused on your core business. Understanding your needs and ensuring the right candidate for the position is the key to our success.
This is the best route to take when:
- You need to fill the position quickly
- You want access to a vast talent pool of high-quality, prescreened candidates
- Your position is suited for temporary hiring services, contract staffing, or contract-to-hire recruiting, and you intend to direct the work activity.
- You are hiring an employee as a direct placement but aren’t able to recruit effectively or efficiently with your internal staff.
- You aren’t familiar with current salary rates, market trends, and available skill sets
2. Hire an experienced freelancer
The freelance, or gig, economy continues to grow, with more talent available daily. Freelancers provide high-quality work without a long-term commitment. They can offer you a fresh perspective, more flexibility, and increase efficiency. While the freelance market isn’t ideal for every position, cloud architects are often a great fit.
We recommend this option when:
- Your need is project-based
- The work can be performed remotely
- You do not intend to direct the daily work activity
- You are hiring for expertise your internal team does not possess
- You do not require an employee to work onsite or follow a specific schedule
We recommend using either Toptal, Upwork, or both.
Toptal
Toptal is an exclusive network of the top freelance software developers, designers, finance experts, product managers, and project managers in the world. Toptal vets its freelancers before making them accessible, ensuring their legitimacy. Top companies hire Toptal freelancers for their most important projects. Hiring a cloud architect on Toptal can help you quickly get the results you need.
Upwork
Upwork is a freelance talent network that helps individuals connect with experts in a variety of fields to accomplish project-based needs. When you have a specific, well-defined goal in mind, this can be a great path to hiring an experienced cloud architect. If you are satisfied with the outcome you can continue to book the same freelancer through Upwork’s easy-to-use project interface.
3. Post the opening on a top job board
Your best option may be to advertise your opening on a proven job board. There are many widely used job sites out there that draw visits from qualified candidates. If you have someone internally who can dedicate the time and energy to sort through applications and screen individuals effectively, this can be a great choice.
We recommend using a job board when:
- Your internal recruiting team has the knowledge and experience to assess candidate qualifications
- You are hiring a direct employee and have time to manage the entire recruiting effort
- You have a process for receiving, screening, and tracking all resumes and applications
- You are prepared to respond to all applicants
We recommend using CareerBuilder when hiring a cloud architect:
CareerBuilder
CareerBuilder has been a trusted source for hiring since 1995. Reach 80+ million unique, diverse U.S. job seekers annually by posting your jobs through their talent acquisition channels. Through CareerBuilder, you can engage candidates and drive them into your sourcing pipeline. We recommend using CareerBuilder for hiring when you have the internal resources and processes to review, screen, and reply to all applicants.
4. Leverage your internal resources
You can utilize your own website, social media, and employees to assist in your search for top candidates.
A company website posting should be the first step in notifying prospective candidates that you are hiring. Social media can also be a powerful tool for spreading the word about your new opening. As far as exposure is concerned, this option can be as good as some job boards when you have a large enough following across various platforms, like LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter.
Current employees are every organization’s greatest asset. Encourage your internal team to promote job openings to their network by offering cash and other incentives.
We recommend these options when:
- Your brand has great name recognition
- You can consistently monitor and respond to candidate activity through your website and social media accounts
- You have a process in place to quickly and broadly communicate job openings and requirements
- You have an effective employee referral program in place
If you aren’t sure which path is best, schedule a discovery call today with our seasoned recruiting professionals. The 4 Corner team is on standby to help you find the best option for your unique hiring need.
Sample Interview Questions
- What is your experience with cloud computing and how have you implemented cloud solutions in the past?
- What are your approaches to cloud security and data privacy?
- In a cloud environment, how do you ensure high availability and disaster recovery?
- What methods do you use to optimize cloud costs?
- Do you manage virtual machines and storage in the cloud?
- Can you explain your experience with cloud migration and how you have successfully migrated applications and data to the cloud?
- How do you stay up-to-date with new cloud technologies and industry best practices?
- What challenges have you faced managing multi-cloud and hybrid cloud environments?
- What is your experience with cloud automation and DevOps practices?
- What is an example of a complex cloud solution you have designed and implemented, and how did you overcome challenges?