Storage Senior SAN SME / Architect in Sheffield

Company Description

HelloKindred are specialists in staffing marketing, creative and technology roles, offering a range of talent solutions that can be delivered on-site, remotely or hybrid. Our vision is to make work accessible and people’s lives better. We do this by disrupting traditional employment barriers – connecting ambitious talent to flexible opportunities with trusted brands.

Job Description

Anticipated Contract End Date/Length: November 30, 2026
Work Set Up: Hybrid

Our client in the Information Technology and Services industry is looking for a Storage Senior SAN SME / Architect to lead the design and architecture of enterprise storage platforms. This role requires a highly experienced professional with strong technical depth and the ability to confidently articulate architectural decisions, trade-offs, and design patterns across multiple storage technologies. The position focuses on delivering scalable, resilient, and high-performing storage solutions aligned with enterprise requirements and best practices.

What you will do:

• Lead end-to-end design of enterprise storage solutions from requirements gathering through high-level and low-level design.
• Define target-state storage architectures aligned to application, performance, scalability, and resilience requirements.
• Act as a technical authority in architecture discussions, clearly explaining design decisions, trade-offs, and alternatives.
• Produce detailed architecture documentation including high-level designs, low-level designs, and design rationales.
• Design and advise on block, file, and object storage solutions based on workload requirements.
• Contribute to architecture decisions related to backup, replication, disaster recovery, and data protection strategies.
• Integrate storage solutions with platforms such as VMware environments including vSphere and vCenter.
• Design solutions using enterprise storage platforms including SAN and NAS technologies.
• Evaluate storage platforms to ensure alignment with architectural and operational requirements.
• Ensure solutions meet best practices for availability, performance, security, scalability, and supportability.
• Review and challenge existing architectures to identify risks, improvements, and optimization opportunities.
• Engage with technical and non-technical stakeholders to provide guidance and design justification.
• Lead workshops and design reviews to align stakeholders on architectural direction.
• Mentor and support engineering teams on storage architecture principles and best practices.

Qualifications

• Proven experience in a Storage Architect or senior storage engineering role with strong design ownership.
• Strong expertise in SAN and enterprise storage technologies.
• In-depth knowledge of at least one storage domain such as block, file, object storage, or data protection.
• Broad architectural understanding of multiple storage paradigms beyond primary specialization.
• Experience designing storage solutions for enterprise environments.
• Experience integrating storage platforms with virtualization technologies such as VMware.
• Familiarity with enterprise storage vendors such as Dell, NetApp, HPE, Pure Storage, or equivalent.
• Strong experience producing and presenting architectural documentation.
• Understanding of data protection, backup, replication, and disaster recovery strategies.
• Experience working with virtualized or containerized environments such as Kubernetes or OpenShift is advantageous.
• Strong communication and stakeholder management skills with the ability to explain complex technical concepts clearly.
• Demonstrated ability to evaluate trade-offs and make pragmatic architectural decisions.
• Relevant storage or architecture certifications are advantageous.

Additional Information

Candidates must be legally authorized to live and work in the country where the position is based, without requiring employer sponsorship. HelloKindred is committed to fair, transparent, and inclusive hiring practices. We assess candidates based on skills, experience, and role-related requirements. We appreciate your interest in this opportunity. While we review every application carefully, only candidates selected for an interview will be contacted. HelloKindred is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applicants of all backgrounds and do not discriminate on the basis of race, colour, religion, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law.