Cloud Architect

We are looking for an experienced Cloud Technical Architect with a strong focus on Kubernetes to join our team. In this role, you will act as a trusted technical leader, owning and evolving Kubernetes-based platforms across public cloud and on-premises environments, while ensuring architectural excellence, operational reliability, and financial accountability., * Application Ownership & Lifecycle Accountability: Act as Application Owner for Kubernetes-based platforms and workloads across public cloud and on-prem environments. Ensure end-to-end accountability for the application lifecycle, including operational readiness, availability, security, compliance, capacity planning, upgrades, and decommissioning.

• Architectural Leadership: Translate business and IT strategy into scalable and secure cloud architectures in close collaboration with a group of Technical Architects. Define and maintain cloud building blocks, architecture standards, and reference patterns, while providing architectural oversight to ensure alignment with enterprise objectives.
• Platform Optimization: Continuously evaluate and improve the performance, reliability, and efficiency of the Kubernetes platform. Propose, validate, and prioritize platform enhancements to ensure the environment evolves in line with business demand and operational needs.
• Feasibility Studies & Impact Analysis: Conduct feasibility studies in collaboration with internal technical teams and cloud providers. Assess architectural, operational, and financial impacts of proposed changes, ensuring decisions support the overall cloud and infrastructure strategy.
• Cost Management & Financial Governance: Embed cost awareness into all architectural and platform decisions. Apply FinOps principles to ensure financial transparency, cost efficiency, and sustainable cloud consumption across public cloud and on-prem environments.
• Technical Guidance & Mentorship: Provide expert-level technical guidance within your domain. Mentor team members, promote best practices, and support the successful delivery of projects through knowledge sharing and technical leadership.
• Quality Assurance & Partner Oversight: Review and validate technical deliverables produced by external partners. Ensure solutions meet defined quality standards, architectural requirements, and operational expectations, while maintaining strong alignment with internal teams., * Kubernetes Expertise: Designs, operates, and optimizes Kubernetes workloads and platforms, ensuring reliability, scalability, and efficient resource utilization.
• Infrastructure as Code (Terraform): Defines and applies IaC practices using Terraform to deliver consistent, secure, and governed cloud and Kubernetes environments.
• Application Ownership: Demonstrates end-to-end accountability for the full application lifecycle, including operational readiness, availability, security, compliance, upgrades, and decommissioning.
• Cloud Architecture: Designs and governs scalable, secure cloud architectures; defines reusable building blocks and standards; ensures alignment with enterprise and business strategy.
• Hybrid Architecture: Architects and operates hybrid solutions spanning public, private, and multi-cloud environments, addressing connectivity, security, resilience, and operational consistency.
• Platform Optimization: Continuously improves platform performance, reliability, and efficiency through targeted enhancements and measurable outcomes.
• Cost Management & FinOps: Applies FinOps principles to drive cost transparency, optimization, and financially sound architectural and platform decisions.
• Feasibility & Impact Analysis: Leads feasibility studies and impact analyses to inform architectural, operational, and financial decision-making.
• Partner Quality Assurance: Validates and governs technical deliverables from external partners to ensure quality, compliance, and architectural alignment.
• Technical Leadership: Provides technical leadership through mentoring, guidance, and knowledge sharing to elevate team capability and delivery quality.

• Fluency in French (C1) and/or Dutch (C1), with strong proficiency in English (C2) - written and spoken
• Ability to work on-site in Brussels twice a week, with Thursday as a fixed day
• Minimum 5 years of demonstrable experience as a Cloud Architect on Microsoft Azure, with direct involvement in designing, implementing, and governing production-grade cloud architectures
• Minimum 5 years of hands-on experience with Kubernetes in production environments, covering both application workloads and platform-level concerns
• Demonstrable experience operating and architecting workloads across public cloud and on-prem environments, including hybrid connectivity, shared governance, and operational consistency
• Demonstrable experience defining, applying, or enforcing architecture standards and governance frameworks within an enterprise environment