Senior GCP Cloud & Integration Architect

Role: Senior GCP Cloud & Integration Architect

Location: Greenwood Village, Colorado (Onsite)

Type: Contract

Day-to-Day Job Duties:

• Lead the architecture, design, and governance of enterprise Google Cloud Platform (GCP) solutions supporting large-scale digital transformation and modernization initiatives.
• Design hybrid cloud architectures integrating GCP environments with on-premises data centers, enterprise applications, third-party platforms, and multi-cloud ecosystems.
• Establish scalable integration patterns leveraging APIs, microservices, event-driven architectures, and cloud-native services.
• Lead workload modernization initiatives, including migration of legacy applications, virtual machines, and services to GKE, Cloud Run, and other cloud-native platforms.
• Define migration strategies, deployment roadmaps, transition architectures, and cutover plans to enable seamless technology transformation.
• Architect and implement event-driven integration frameworks using Google Cloud Pub/Sub, Eventarc, Kafka, and related messaging technologies.
• Design enterprise data integration and ingestion solutions utilizing BigQuery, Cloud Dataflow, Cloud SQL, Cloud Spanner, and associated cloud data services.
• Establish API management standards, service communication models, and reusable integration frameworks across enterprise platforms.
• Drive Infrastructure as Code (IaC) adoption utilizing Terraform, Terragrunt, Ansible, and GitOps-based delivery methodologies.
• Partner with DevOps, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), and application teams to implement scalable CI/CD pipelines and deployment automation practices.
• Define and enforce cloud security, governance, compliance, identity management, encryption, and observability standards.
• Lead architecture reviews, technical design workshops, and governance forums to ensure alignment with enterprise technology strategies.
• Collaborate with business stakeholders, engineering leaders, and delivery teams to translate strategic objectives into scalable technology solutions.
• Mentor development, platform engineering, and integration teams on cloud-native architecture, engineering best practices, and enterprise integration standards.

Basic Qualifications:

• Cloud Platform Expertise: 8+ years in enterprise IT architecture, with 4+ years of dedicated, hands-on design and implementation experience on Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
• Certifications: Google Cloud Certified Professional Cloud Architect or Professional Cloud Network/Security Engineer.
• Integration Patterns: Proven expertise in API gateway architectures (Apigee / Cloud Endpoints), event-driven systems (Pub/Sub, Kafka), distributed caching, and synchronous vs. asynchronous integration patterns.
• Containers & Orchestration: Deep expertise in Kubernetes/GKE, container networking, ingress controllers, Helm charts, and service meshes.
• Infrastructure Automation: Production-level fluency with Terraform, GitOps workflows, and configuration management tools.
• Networking & Security: Practical knowledge of GCP Shared VPCs, Cloud Interconnect, firewall rules, Private Service Connect, and Cloud Armor.

Nice to Have (But Not a Must):

• Google Cloud Professional Cloud Architect, Professional Cloud Network Engineer, Professional Cloud Security Engineer, or equivalent cloud certifications.
• Experience with Apigee, Cloud Endpoints, Kafka, Confluent, OpenTelemetry, Prometheus, and enterprise observability platforms.
• Experience implementing GitOps practices and CI/CD tooling such as GitLab CI, Cloud Build, ArgoCD, or equivalent platforms.
• Experience with multi-cloud environments spanning GCP, AWS, Azure, and on-premises infrastructure.
• Familiarity with OSS/BSS platforms, billing systems, provisioning systems, inventory management, and operational support environments.
• Experience supporting large-scale cloud migration, application modernization, and enterprise integration transformation programs.
• Knowledge of FinOps practices, cloud cost management, and resource optimization strategies.