Principal Architect, Infrastructure

Carnival · Miami

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The Principal Architect, Infrastructure leads the design of infrastructure solutions to support the strategic objectives of Carnival Cruise Line. This role involves technically leading and creating detailed designs and documentation to support the development, implementation, and operations of enterprise-class systems used globally across ship and shore locations. The Principal Architect role serves both as the architecture lead and mentor to other architects and engineers.

Essential Functions:

• Design: Lead collaboration with key stakeholders to design and implement secure, robust, and scalable infrastructure solutions aligned with business objectives.  Perform engineering function on projects as required. Collaborate with various teams, including networking, facility, and applications, to ensure solutions meet requirements and comply with Carnival Corporation policies and processes.  Lead the design, plan, document, and support the configuration of logical and physical system layouts with a focus on reducing operating costs or increasing guest and crew experience.  Provide cost estimates (i.e. labor, hardware, software, etc.) for capital and project planning.  Lead collaboration with the engineering teams to adjust designs, intake as-built documents, and make appropriate adjustments to documentation and designs.  Educate team members on Carnival’s infrastructure strategies, tools, and frameworks.   

• Compliance and Security: Ensure that infrastructure solutions adhere to security policies, and compliance requirements.  Lead the definition of best practices and ensure they are documented and implemented. Lead Disaster Recovery and Business continuity planning, testing, and execution. 

• Operations:  Ensure consistent and reliable operations across infrastructure platforms through oversight of managed service providers, contractors, and other stakeholders. Ensure the optimization of the enterprise infrastructure architecture to achieve high availability and performance for various business applications.  Collaborate with vendors for implementation and remediation efforts.  Ensure automation and monitoring. Recommend and implement solutions to ensure operational efficiency and system reliability.  Lead independent platform assessments and develop procedures to confirm or establish that standards are implemented correctly and are effective. 

• Review postmortem document and make changes to architecture and planning for the solution.  Lead the resolution of challenging problems on availability, scalability, and performance to prevent critical applications outages.

• Support:  Collaborate with CCL Service Delivery Managers on production issues.  Act as level 4 escalation for managed service provider, diagnose and resolve production issues as required.  Ensure that changes made to production are reflected design documentation.  Mentor and lead technical and tactical teams when necessary.

• Governance:  Develop, document, and maintain architectural standards and policies that improve the resilience and performance of the company’s IT infrastructure.   Ensure internal processes are followed (i.e. CAB, PRRB, ATR).  Design and implement security and disaster recovery strategies. Provide project guidance and direction to project teams, ensuring proper practices are followed and risks are mitigated.

• Research and Innovation: Function as a SME for Infrastructure design.  Stay abreast of emerging technologies, industry trends, and best practices. Research new tools, frameworks, and methodologies that can enhance solution designs and delivery. Evaluate and recommend solutions. Develop and communicate technology roadmaps. Review and improve tools, methods, processes, and procedures. Collaborate to develop and document next generation systems. Lead the development of system solution standards.

• Leadership:   Coach, review, and delegate work to less experienced staff.  Sought out by other technicians and leaders for expertise.  Collaborates directly with business leaders.

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities:

• Scope: - Partner with Shipboard personnel,  Collaborate with both Shoreside and Shipboard,  Global Responsibilities (All Brands). Provides enterprise-wide technical leadership for the architecture, design, and evolution of the organization's infrastructure platforms, including cloud, data center, compute, storage, networking, virtualization, identity, endpoint services, and foundational technologies. Establishes architectural standards, reference architectures, and technology roadmaps that support business growth, cybersecurity, operational resilience, and digital transformation initiatives. Leads the most complex infrastructure modernization efforts, evaluates emerging technologies, and ensures infrastructure investments align with enterprise strategy, compliance requirements, and operational excellence. Serves as the organization's highest-level infrastructure technical authority, partnering with executives, security, application architecture, operations, and vendors to deliver scalable, resilient, and cost-effective infrastructure solutions.

• Problem Solving: Addresses the organization's most complex and ambiguous infrastructure challenges where solutions often require balancing competing priorities such as cost, performance, security, availability, and technical debt. Evaluates multiple architectural approaches, anticipates future business and technology needs, and develops innovative enterprise-scale solutions. Resolves cross-functional technical issues spanning multiple infrastructure domains, vendors, cloud providers, and business units. Exercises significant independent judgment in establishing architectural direction, evaluating emerging technologies, mitigating enterprise risks, and resolving issues with broad organizational impact. Examples include Designing enterprise hybrid and multi-cloud architectures. Developing infrastructure strategies supporting AI and high-performance computing. Modernizing legacy infrastructure while minimizing business disruption. Creating resilient  architectures that meet aggressive recovery objectives. Standardizing enterprise platforms across global locations.

• Impact: The decisions made by this role have enterprise-wide implications for technology reliability, security, scalability, operational efficiency, and business continuity. Successful execution enables critical business applications, accelerates cloud adoption, strengthens cybersecurity posture, reduces operational risk, improves system availability, and optimizes infrastructure investment. Architectural decisions directly influence technology standards, platform lifecycle management, disaster recovery capabilities, and the organization's ability to rapidly adopt emerging technologies such as AI, automation, and hybrid cloud services.

• Leadership: Provides technical leadership and strategic influence across the enterprise without direct operational authority. Establishes infrastructure architecture principles, governance processes, engineering standards, and technology roadmaps. Serves as a trusted advisor to senior technology leadership, architects, engineering teams, cybersecurity, and business stakeholders. Mentors architects and senior engineers, promotes engineering best practices, and drives architectural consistency across multiple programs and initiatives. Leads enterprise architecture reviews, influences executive technology investment decisions, and represents infrastructure architecture during strategic planning, vendor engagements, audits, and major transformation programs.

Essential/Minimal Qualifications: 

• Bachelor’s Degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, or related field or equivalent work experience 

• Master’s Degree, preferred

• VMWare, preferred

• MCP, preferred

• Cisco Certified Network Administrator (CCNA), preferred

• Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate (MSCA), preferred

• Enterprise Hypervisor, preferred

• Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert, preferred

• Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), preferred

• AWS Certified Solutions Architect, preferred

• Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert, preferred

• Google Professional Cloud Architect, preferred

• Microsoft Certified System Engineer (MCSE) , preferred

• Project Management Professional (PMP)-PMI, preferred

• Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), preferred

• Advanced understanding of Redhat Linux 6,7,8; Cloud AWS/Azure; Virtualization technologies (VmWare); Dell Servers; Dell/EMC Storage; Hyperconverged Infrastructure; Understand of networking concepts as they relate to infrastructure; Vulnerability tools such as Qualys, Teneble; Containerization technologies (Docker, Openshift etc); Server build automation (Ansible, Powershell etc).

• Excellent knowledge of network hardware, protocols, and standards.

• Excellent understanding of infrastructure security and scalability.

• Excellent understanding of disaster recovery solutions and execution strategies.

• Advanced skills in critical thinking, creative problem solving, and root cause analysis with the ability to lead tech teams through this process. 

• Ability to quickly pivot to changing priorities while managing multiple deadlines.   

• Outstanding analytical skills and attention to detail with exceptional business acumen.   

• Ability to write comprehensive and concise technical communications (i.e. email, reports, presentations) to be consumed by non-technical individuals including executive management.

• Ability to create PowerPoint presentations that are informative and engaging and deliver them to various audiences including executive management. Comfortable presenting to senior executives. 

• Exceptional communication, team building, conflict management, and organizational skills.   

• Excellent track record of working collaboratively and leading cross-functional teams to achieve common goals and drive exceptional results. 

• Proficiency in MS Office. 

• Proven ability to quickly learn and teach new technologies and concepts. 

• Ability to successfully navigate team dynamics.         

Essential Experience Required: 

• 10+ years’ Experience as an Infrastructure Architect, designing and implementing complex infrastructure solutions in a sophisticated environment.

• 7+ years’ Experience providing infrastructure support for complex operational and design issues.

• 7+ years’ Experience in Linux architecture, administration, and support.

• 7+ years’ Experience designing SAN and NAS Storage solutions. 

• 7+ years’ Experience implementing and supporting Backup solutions.

• 7+ years’ Experience with physical infrastructure Dell, HPE, EMC, Veritas, etc.

• 5+ years’ Experience with hyper-converged infrastructure design and implementation.

• 5+ years’ Experience collaborating with a vendor to create a SOW and managing their scope, delivery, and budget. 

• 5+ years’ Experience planning and leading large projects. 

• 7+ years’ Experience in ITIL and IT project management via various SDLCs (i.e. Agile, Waterfall, Hybrid, etc.)

• 5+ years’ Experience informally leading cross-functional technology teams.

• 1+ years In the cruise and/or travel industry.

Travel: Less than 25% with shipboard travel likely

Work Conditions:Work primarily in a climate-controlled environment with minimal safety/health hazard potential.

Physical Demands:. Must be able to remain in a stationary position at a desk and/or computer for extended periods of time.

This position is classified as “remote.”  As a remote role, it allows employees to work full-time from their home. It may also require regular travel to Carnival headquarters in Miami, FL for in-office collaboration. 

At Carnival, your total rewards package is much more than your base salary. All non-sales roles participate in an annual cash bonus program, while sales roles have an incentive plan. Director and above roles may also be eligible to participate in Carnival’s discretionary equity incentive plan. Plus, Carnival provides comprehensive and innovative benefits to meet your needs, including: 

• Health Benefits: 
  • Cost-effective medical, dental and vision plans 
  • Employee Assistance Program and other mental health resources 
  • Additional programs include company paid term life insurance and disability coverage  
• Financial Benefits: 
  • 401(k) plan that includes a company match 
  • Employee Stock Purchase plan 
• Paid Time Off 
  • Holidays – All full-time and part-time with benefits employees receive days off for 8 company-wide holidays, plus 2 additional floating holidays to be taken at the employee’s discretion.  
  • Vacation Time – All full-time employees at the manager and below level start with 14 days/year; director and above level start with 19 days/year.  Part-time with benefits employees receive time off based on the number of hours they work, with a minimum of 84 hours/year.  All employees gain additional vacation time with further tenure. 
  • Sick Time – All full-time employees receive 80 hours of sick time each year.  Part-time with benefits employees receive time off based on the number of hours they work, with a minimum of 60 hours each year.   
• Other Benefits 
  • Complementary stand-by cruises, employee discounts on confirmed cruises, plus special rates for family and friends 
  • Personal and professional learning and development resources including tuition reimbursement  
  • On-site Fitness center at our Miami campus 

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