Senior Principal Engineer - IBM Z/OS
Posted 1 week ago by Vallum Associates
Negotiable
Inside
Hybrid
Sheffield, England, United Kingdom
Summary: The Senior Principal Engineer role focuses on advanced technical expertise in IBM Z systems, including z/OS and IBM I, with a strong emphasis on observability, security, and modern tooling. The position requires deep knowledge of OpenTelemetry, quantum-safe encryption, and DevOps orchestration. This contract role is hybrid, requiring three days onsite in Sheffield, UK, and is classified as inside IR35.
Key Responsibilities:
- Demonstrate deep-level expertise in IBM Z platforms, including z/OS and IBM I.
- Implement and configure OpenTelemetry for observability and distributed tracing.
- Integrate telemetry with industry-standard backends like IBM Instana and Splunk.
- Architect and implement quantum-safe encryption and zero trust architecture.
- Utilize modern DevOps tools for CI/CD and automation frameworks.
- Leverage cloud-native technologies such as Red Hat OpenShift and z/OS Container Extensions.
Key Skills:
- Expertise in IBM Z systems, z/OS, and IBM I.
- Proficient in OpenTelemetry and distributed tracing.
- Knowledge of quantum-safe encryption and zero trust architecture.
- Experience with DevOps tools like GitHub, Jenkins, and Ansible.
- Familiarity with cloud-native stacks and modern development tools.
Salary (Rate): undetermined
City: Sheffield
Country: United Kingdom
Working Arrangements: hybrid
IR35 Status: inside IR35
Seniority Level: undetermined
Industry: IT
The Role: Senior Principal Engineer
Location: Sheffield, UK
Position Type: Contract Inside IR35
Remote work option Available: Hybrid – 3 Days Onsite
Job Description:
Technical Expertise & Tooling Mastery
- Core Platforms Engineering Depth - IBM Z: Deep-level expertise in z/OS, parallel sysplex, GDPS, WLM, CF structures, USS, and RMF/SMF performance analysis.
- IBM I: Comprehensive mastery of IBM I objects, Integrated File System (IFS) and PowerHA clusters.
- OpenTelemetry & Observability Stack
- OTel Specification: Deep understanding of the Open Telemetry Protocol (OTLP), including the design and configuration of OTel Collectors (receivers, processors, and exporters).
- Distributed Tracing: Experience with context propagation (W3C Trace Context) to link mainframe transactions to distributed microservices.
- Backend Integration: Ability to export telemetry to industry-standard backends such as IBM Instana, Splunk, Dynatrace, Elastic, or Grafana/Prometheus.
- Middleware Mastery: Hands-on experience with zCEE, CICS, DB2, and MQ. You should understand how to enable trace propagation across these subsystems using OTel-compatible headers.
- Quantum-Safe Encryption & Modern Security
- PQC (Post-Quantum Cryptography): Knowledge of implementing Quantum-Safe APIs and algorithms (like Crystals-Kyber) available on the IBM z16 and modern Power systems.
- Pervasive Encryption: Expert-level ability to implement Dataset and File System encryption with zero impact on application logic.
- Zero Trust Architecture: Architecting "Least Privilege" access systems and ensuring end-to-end encryption of data using AT-TLS or TLS 1.3.
- Modern Tooling & Open Platform Integration
- DevOps Orchestration: Mastery of GitHub (Actions/Enterprise), Jenkins, and Ansible for cross-platform CI/CD.
- Automation Frameworks: Expert-level Ansible Automation Platform usage, including specialized IBM Z/I Collections for system automation.
- Cloud-Native Stack: Expert knowledge of Red Hat OpenShift (OCP) and z/OS Container Extensions (zCX).
- Modern DevEx: Experience of Zowe and VS Code to modernize the engineering interface.