Lead Infrastructure Engineer — Windows OS Engineering

Role: Lead Infrastructure Engineer - Windows OS Engineering

Location: Irving, TX (Hybrid)

Type: Contract

Job Description Summary:

• The Lead Infrastructure Engineer for Windows OS Engineering provides technical leadership for enterprise Windows Server platform engineering, golden image lifecycle, patch/update infrastructure, configuration governance, security hardening, and automation. This role leads modernization of Windows OS engineering practices across on-premises, virtualized, bare-metal, and public cloud environments.
• This role will help deliver key OS Engineering priorities including Windows Server 2025 production readiness, Windows Golden Image automation with GitHub Actions, WSUS modernization, RackN integration, Azure/GCP image lifecycle alignment, compliance scanning, configuration baseline governance, observability, and technical debt reduction. The role requires deep Windows engineering experience, strong automation skills, and the ability to lead cross-functional delivery in a regulated enterprise environment.

About this role:

• Client is seeking a Lead Infrastructure Engineer for Windows OS Engineering to lead the design, automation, and modernization of enterprise Windows Server platforms. This role is ideal for an experienced Windows engineer who can set technical direction, build durable engineering standards, and lead complex initiatives across image creation, patching, compliance, automation, public cloud, and platform enablement.
• You will lead by example by developing reusable automation, improving golden image pipelines, strengthening security and compliance controls, and reducing manual operational work. This role blends hands-on Windows engineering with technical leadership, roadmap execution, architecture alignment, and mentoring of other engineers.

In this role, you will:

• Lead complex Windows OS Engineering initiatives focused on Windows Server platform modernization, image lifecycle, patch automation, compliance, and operational readiness.
• Architect and improve Windows Server golden image pipelines for on-premises virtualization, bare-metal, and public cloud environments.
• Lead Windows Server 2025 engineering readiness, production release activities, lifecycle documentation, layered product alignment, and catalog readiness.
• Design and implement automated image creation and validation workflows using tools such as Packer, GitHub Actions, Ansible, PowerShell, CI/CD pipelines, and GitOps-aligned processes.
• Lead Windows patch and update engineering improvements, including WSUS-related capabilities, update orchestration, validation, rollback patterns, and change-control alignment.
• Drive Windows security baseline implementation, GPO configuration governance, CIS-aligned controls, drift detection, remediation automation, and audit-ready evidence generation.
• Partner with security, risk, cloud, operations, software delivery, storage, virtualization, and application teams to ensure Windows platforms are secure, supportable, observable, and consumable at scale.
• Improve integration of enterprise tooling in Windows images, including monitoring, logging, endpoint/security controls, vulnerability scanning, certificate trust, Azure Arc, MECM/SCCM, and related operational agents.
• Lead automation parity improvements across Windows and Linux OS Engineering where common patterns can reduce risk and increase consistency.
• Provide technical oversight for RackN/bare-metal provisioning, hardware certification, storage certification, failover clustering, and platform enablement activities.
• Mentor engineers, review technical designs, guide troubleshooting, and establish reusable engineering standards and runbooks.
• Use observability and analytics to improve Windows image build success/failure tracking, patch outcomes, compliance visibility, and proactive issue detection.

Required Qualifications:

• 5+ years of Windows Server engineering, platform engineering, infrastructure automation, or equivalent enterprise infrastructure experience.
• Strong hands-on experience with Windows Server platforms, including Windows Server 2019, 2022, and/or 2025.
• Experience designing, building, hardening, and maintaining Windows Server golden images or standardized OS builds.
• Strong automation experience with PowerShell, Ansible for Windows, Git, GitHub, and CI/CD pipeline workflows.
• Experience with Windows patching ecosystems such as WSUS, MECM/SCCM, update rings, maintenance windows, and rollback planning.
• Experience with Active Directory, DNS, GPO, certificate services, Windows security controls, and enterprise authentication patterns.
• Experience implementing security baselines, CIS/STIG-aligned controls, configuration drift management, or compliance remediation.
• Experience working in regulated delivery environments with change control, evidence collection, traceability, audit readiness, and controlled releases.
• Ability to lead technical design, mentor engineers, and drive execution across infrastructure, operations, security, and application teams.

Desired Qualifications:

• Experience with Packer, image factory patterns, automated VM image lifecycle, or immutable infrastructure practices.
• Experience publishing or managing Windows images in Azure and/or GCP.
• Experience with Azure Arc, Azure Update Manager, public cloud governance, or hybrid cloud operating models.
• Experience with RackN, bare-metal provisioning, hardware certification, firmware automation, or virtualization platform integration.
• Experience with Windows Failover Clustering, storage integrations, PowerMax, PowerFlex, Pure, or Cisco UCS certification.
• Experience with Grafana, Splunk, Power BI, or other observability and analytics platforms.
• Experience with GitOps, infrastructure-as-code, configuration-as-code, or PR-based infrastructure delivery.
• Strong executive communication skills with the ability to summarize technical risk, delivery blockers, roadmap dependencies, and engineering outcomes.