Platform Engineering Lead

CenExel • ,

2d

About The Position

The Platform Engineering Lead reports directly to the CTO and owns the full lifecycle of shared platform and software-delivery capabilities, from discovery and prioritization through implementation, adoption, operations, and continuous improvement. The role provides shared services, standards, tooling, automation, and SRE practices to help engineering teams deliver reliable software efficiently, allowing the VP of Engineering to focus on engineering leadership and product delivery.

The role works closely with the VP of IT Operations, who leads infrastructure systems and the service desk, to establish clear operational responsibilities. SRE resides within the platform team, while application ownership remains with engineering teams. On-call coverage and incident-management responsibilities are defined collaboratively with engineering leaders and IT Operations. The lead serves as a hands-on player-coach, leading one or two platform and SRE engineers in India while contributing to technical design and implementation.

CenExel is a nationwide clinical research site and patient network with 18 Centers of Excellence. The role operates in an established, regulated organization and is expected to balance improvement with continuity of service. The work arrangement is remote or hybrid, with approximately 10% travel to support sites across the network.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, software engineering, information systems, engineering, or a related technical field, or an equivalent combination of education, training, and relevant professional experience.
• Background in platform engineering, developer productivity, cloud infrastructure, DevOps, or site reliability engineering (SRE), including relevant leadership experience.
• Demonstrated success building shared capabilities adopted across engineering teams and measurably improving delivery performance and system reliability.
• Experience working in established or regulated organizations, with a practical, adaptable approach suited to a small-team environment.
• Experience with Microsoft products, including Azure, Azure DevOps, and Dynamics.
• Must be based in the United States.
• Ability to serve as a hands-on player-coach, lead one or two platform and SRE engineers in India, and contribute directly to technical design and implementation.
• Ability to report to work as scheduled.

Nice To Haves

• Relevant cloud, DevOps, or SRE certifications are valued but not required.

Responsibilities

• Build trusted partnerships with engineering teams, observe workflows, and use developer feedback to turn recurring friction into shared capabilities and measurable improvements.
• Own the lifecycle of shared platform and software-delivery capabilities, from discovery and prioritization through implementation, adoption, operations, and continuous improvement.
• Develop and manage an outcome-driven roadmap for delivery tooling, cloud foundations, reusable services, reliability, and developer experience; make pragmatic build-versus-buy decisions for a small team.
• Create reusable, self-service capabilities that let teams deliver safely and independently, with appropriate controls embedded in tools, workflows, and automation.
• Own CI/CD, release automation, deployment and rollback capabilities, shared testing platforms, and source-code repository and branching standards.
• Define code-review expectations and implement automated quality gates, including branch protections, static analysis, dependency and security scanning, build validation, and automated testing.
• Own cloud platform foundations, infrastructure as code, environment provisioning, secrets and artifact management, shared integration infrastructure, and reusable technical services.
• Establish SRE practices for critical applications and platform services, including observability, service-level objectives, on-call coverage, incident response, problem management, and resilience planning.
• Partner with Engineering, IT Operations, Security, and Quality to embed controls and validation evidence into delivery pipelines and establish ownership and escalation paths.
• Provide backup leadership during critical infrastructure incidents in partnership with IT Operations while maintaining primary ownership and escalation protocols.
• Establish performance baselines and track deployment frequency, change lead time, change failure rate, deployment recovery time, pipeline reliability, automated-test effectiveness, platform adoption, and developer experience.
• Use performance data, incident trends, and developer feedback to reduce build times, unreliable tests, deployment friction, and recurring manual work; partner with engineering leaders on maintainability, technical debt, and application reliability.
• Evaluate and pilot AI-assisted engineering and operations tools, validate their value, and implement appropriate governance and controls before broader adoption.
• Reduce vendor and key-person dependencies through automation, documentation, cross-training, and knowledge transfer.
• Lead through influence in an established, regulated organization, balancing improvement with continuity of service and building support for sustainable change.
• Support and ensure strict adherence to best practices, FDA Code of Federal Regulations, ICH, GCP, CenExel standard operating procedures, site working practices, protocols, and company guidelines and policies.
• Assume other duties and responsibilities as assigned.

Benefits

• Competitive compensation.
• Health insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• Dental insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• Vision insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• Long-term disability insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• Short-term disability insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• Life insurance for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• 401(k) for full-time employees after 30 days of employment.
• An exceptional work environment promoting teamwork, positive leadership, and work-life balance.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager