SENIOR COMPUTER SPECIALIST
Req #: | 171795 |
Department: | ELECTRICAL & COMPUTER ENGINEERING |
Posting Date: | 09/11/2019 |
Closing Info: | Open Until Filled |
Salary: | Salary is commensurate with experience and education |
Shift: | First Shift |
Notes: | As a UW employee, you will enjoy generous benefits and work/life programs. For detailed information on Benefits for this position, click here. |
UW faculty and staff also enjoy outstanding benefits, professional growth opportunities and unique resources in an environment noted for diversity, intellectual excitement, artistic pursuits and natural beauty. All of which has allowed the UW to be nationally recognized as a “Great College to Work For” for five consecutive years.
The Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of Washington is a nationally ranked education and research program. Located on the main Seattle campus at the University of Washington, UW ECE department currently supports greater than 750 undergraduate and graduate students and over 50 active research faculty. UW ECE department is a dynamic organization that provides comprehensive administrative and advising services in support of our teaching, research, and service missions.
The Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering has an outstanding opportunity for a Senior Computer Specialist.
The Senior Computer Specialist will provide comprehensive and essential information services, including maintenance of department computing resources and management of the departmental servers supporting the ECE infrastructure. This position provides support both in person and remotely for customers of services provided by the ECE department and through UW-IT including online collaboration tools (Microsoft, Google), Microsoft Office Suite, MS Exchange email and calendaring, VPN services, enterprise storage services, and software distribution including anti-virus software.
Position Complexities:
• Implement and document policies and procedures for dealing with the future growth of and changes in the ECE department’s support and operational needs. (Examples include: Change Management, Data Backup, and Technology Replacement plan).
• Re-direct requests to the IT manger that cannot or should not be fulfilled by the IT Computing Group. Determine, specify and deploy software and hardware tools, provided by either 3rd party service vendors or the IT Computing Group, to improve the Support and Operations functions.
• Manage software and hardware resources to support education and research lab requirements for ECE engineering courses, including soliciting requirements, judging which are reasonable and necessary to accommodate, and ensuring they are available in a timely fashion.
• Support and coordinate with the IT Manager, ECE staff, both in-house and/or 3rd party technical A/V staff, before and during high-profile events to make sure all technical aspects of event production run smoothly and are highly available.
• Work directly with faculty, staff and students to improve the quality of service they receive.
Position Dimensions and Impact to the University:
The Senior Computer Specialist will follow all IT Computing policies and procedures in relation to departmental, college, university, state and federal rules and regulations. This position will interface with ECE leadership, management, faculty, staff and students to ensure the successful administration of the computational support structure, and advance the ECE department’s mission to support our impact on research, teaching and service
RESPONSIBILITIES:
Technical Support/Help Desk:
• Provide complete support for networks, Mac, Linux, and Windows computers, and software used by faculty, staff, and students. This includes troubleshooting networks, hardware, and software; initiating corrective action and seeing it through; and implementing operating systems enhancements to improve reliability and performance.
• Provide technical support and expertise for various types of software applications including Matlab, Cadence, Mentor Graphics and Multisim.
• Administer desktop user accounts and access to servers using Active Directory.
• Provide training and documentation to users, including preparing training materials as needed.
Server Administration and Management:
• Setup, configure, maintain, and administer Mac, Windows, and Linux servers; printers, scanners, network HUBs, and IP addresses.
• Perform backups on our servers and desktops on a regular routine.
• Specify, recommend for purchase, install, configure, and maintain new and upgraded versions of hardware, software and peripherals.
• Act as liaison with vendors, maintenance providers, and other campus units for facility and equipment.
• Keep thorough maintenance and upgrade records on all ECE computing equipment.
• Prepare Documentation of new programs or changes made to existing programs, including flow charts and system program/user guides, in accordance with established standards and procedures.
Software Management and Support:
• Install and Deploy new software needed using SCCM for distribution to our various computing labs. Managing content using SCCM includes maintenance of the software and integration of approved content.
• Maintain software lists for licensing purposes, utilizing that information for scheduling license renewal in a timely manner throughout the academic school year; emphasis is on ensuring that licenses do not expire.
• Maintain an inventory of all hardware and software within the realm of IT Computing.
Administrative Duties:
• Meet with supervisor as needed to approve purchases, discuss planned upgrades, and review progress on the above duties and responsibilities.
• Other duties as assigned.
Lead Responsibilities:
Supervise UW ECE student workers for various projects for the IT computing group on occasion.
REQUIREMENTS:
• A Bachelor's in computing, computer science, electrical engineering, or related field is required
• Three years’ experience providing direct customer support in an enterprise help desk or service desk environment responsible, for self-service, request fulfillment, incident management, problem and change resolution.
• A broad knowledge of software technologies with experience supporting a variety of productivity and email solutions for Microsoft Windows, Apple Macintosh systems, and Linux/UNIX systems for a diverse customer base consisting of personnel with various skill levels and technical backgrounds.
• Demonstrated working knowledge of current versions of Microsoft Windows and Linux Servers.
• Extensive experience with Linux or other Unix-like environments.
• Must have experience working with data center storage.
• Ability to troubleshoot and maintain server hardware and peripherals.
• Experience in Image deployment and maintaining those images for our labs (SCCM, MDT, or other software)
• Excellent written/oral communication skills, technical documentation skills, user liaison skills, and personal interaction abilities.
• Ability to work with minimal supervision both independently and in a collaborative team environment.
• Ability to successfully exercise independent judgement in resolving complex issues arising from the groups we support that include faculty, staff and students from a wide variety of backgrounds.
• Ability to communicate technical concepts effectively with non-technical faculty and staff.
• Demonstrated ability to successfully manage multiple projects simultaneously.
Equivalent education/experience will substitute for all minimum qualifications except when there are legal requirements, such as a license/certification/registration.
DESIRED EXPERIENCE
• Experience with Microsoft Windows Active Directory, PowerShell scripting, shared file services and access control via groups, UNIX tools, Linux, PERL, Python, Drupal, WordPress, spreadsheet and wiki applications.
• Linux/UNIX system administration.
• Experience automating or improving recurring request fulfillment tasks, e.g. imaging workstations, using or writing PowerShell scripts to query a database for multiple users’ information.
• Knowledge of Linux/UNIX, Windows and Mac interoperability.
• Knowledge of cloud storage and collaborative services such as Google Apps (Docs, Calendar, Gmail) and Office 365.
• Knowledge of Dell PowerEdge server, Silicon Mechanics hardware, and Ricoh Printers.
• Experience with UW Dawg Prints student printing, UW surplus and insurance tools, and UW Student Tech Fee policies.
• Industry certifications for CompTIA and Microsoft preferred.
• Experience working in an academic or university setting.
Application Process:
The application process for UW positions may include completion of a variety of online assessments to obtain additional information that will be used in the evaluation process. These assessments may include Workforce Authorization, Cover Letter and/or others. Any assessments that you need to complete will appear on your screen as soon as you select “Apply to this position”. Once you begin an assessment, it must be completed at that time; if you do not complete the assessment you will be prompted to do so the next time you access your “My Jobs” page. If you select to take it later, it will appear on your "My Jobs" page to take when you are ready. Please note that your application will not be reviewed, and you will not be considered for this position until all required assessments have been completed.
Committed to attracting and retaining a diverse staff, the University of Washington will honor your experiences, perspectives and unique identity. Together, our community strives to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable and welcoming.
The University of Washington is a leader in environmental stewardship & sustainability, and committed to becoming climate neutral.
The University of Washington is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer. To request disability accommodation in the application process, contact the Disability Services Office at 206-543-6450 / 206-543-6452 (tty) or dso@uw.edu.