Senior F5 SME / Architect

Job Title: Senior F5 SME / Architect

Location: Miami, Florida

Employment Type: Contract

Experience Level: Senior / Subject Matter Expert

Position Overview

We are seeking an experienced Senior F5 SME / Architect to lead the design, planning, and execution of enterprise-scale F5 BIG-IP infrastructure refresh and migration initiatives. The ideal candidate will have deep technical expertise in F5 technologies, a proven track record of delivering complex infrastructure migrations, and the ability to lead technical teams through implementation, cutover, and rollback activities.

This role requires a hands-on technical leader who can define the target architecture, develop migration strategies, mitigate implementation risks, and resolve complex technical issues while ensuring minimal disruption to business-critical applications and services.

Key Responsibilities

• Architecture and Design: Lead the architecture, design, and implementation of F5 BIG-IP solutions supporting enterprise application delivery, load balancing, and network traffic management.
• Hardware Refresh: Lead complex F5 BIG-IP hardware refresh projects, including infrastructure assessment, capacity planning, platform sizing, configuration migration, and validation.
• Migration Strategy: Develop and own end-to-end migration strategies, including current-state assessments, target-state architecture, migration sequencing, dependencies, and risk mitigation.
• Implementation Planning: Develop detailed implementation plans, migration runbooks, maintenance windows, and technical execution procedures.
• Cutover and Rollback: Design and lead production cutovers, validation activities, contingency planning, and rollback procedures to minimize downtime and service disruption.
• Technical Leadership: Serve as the primary F5 Subject Matter Expert, providing architectural guidance and technical direction to engineering, network, security, infrastructure, and application teams.
• Complex Troubleshooting: Diagnose and resolve complex F5 BIG-IP issues involving traffic flows, load balancing, application connectivity, SSL/TLS, high availability, and performance.
• Risk and Change Management: Identify technical risks, document dependencies, support change approvals, and ensure appropriate implementation and recovery plans are in place.
• Testing and Validation: Define and oversee pre-migration testing, post-migration validation, application connectivity checks, failover testing, and performance verification.
• Documentation and Knowledge Transfer: Produce architecture diagrams, configuration documentation, migration plans, implementation records, and operational handover materials.
• Project Coordination: Collaborate with project managers, infrastructure teams, vendors, and business stakeholders to ensure successful delivery within agreed timelines and technical requirements.

Required Qualifications

• Extensive hands-on experience with F5 BIG-IP platforms in large, complex enterprise environments.
• Proven experience leading F5 hardware refreshes, platform migrations, and infrastructure modernization initiatives.
• Strong knowledge of F5 BIG-IP LTM (Local Traffic Manager) and associated application delivery technologies.
• Experience with virtual servers, pools, pool members, monitors, persistence profiles, iRules, and traffic policies.
• Strong understanding of TCP/IP, routing, switching, DNS, SSL/TLS, and application networking.
• Experience with high-availability configurations, failover, redundancy, and disaster recovery considerations.
• Demonstrated ability to develop detailed migration strategies, implementation plans, cutover procedures, and rollback plans.
• Experience troubleshooting complex production issues and coordinating resolution across multiple technical teams.
• Strong documentation, communication, stakeholder management, and technical leadership skills.
• Ability to manage multiple workstreams and deliver infrastructure changes within defined maintenance windows.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with F5 BIG-IP DNS/GTM, Advanced WAF, APM, or other relevant F5 modules.
• Experience with BIG-IP software upgrades, configuration migration, and platform compatibility assessments.
• Familiarity with F5 VE, rSeries, or other relevant BIG-IP hardware and virtual platforms.
• Experience with automation and scripting using Python, Ansible, REST APIs, or F5 automation tools.
• Familiarity with enterprise change management, ITIL processes, and production deployment governance.
• Relevant F5 certifications or equivalent demonstrated technical expertise.

Key Deliverables

• Current-state assessment and target-state architecture.
• F5 hardware refresh and migration strategy.
• Detailed migration schedule and implementation runbooks.
• Cutover, testing, validation, and rollback plans.
• Successful migration with minimal business disruption.
• Post-implementation technical documentation and operational handover.

The ideal candidate is a senior-level F5 technical authority who combines deep platform expertise with architecture, project leadership, and hands-on implementation experience. They can independently drive a complex hardware refresh from initial assessment through production cutover and final handover, while coordinating effectively with technical teams and business stakeholders.