Mike Smith, Jr.

The Open Group
Lead Systems Engineer | 2023 - present

• Leading a team of Site Reliability Engineers in architecting and implementing a ROSA (Red Hat OpenShift Service on AWS) platform for the OSDU project, enabling enterprise-scale open-source development
• Driving platform engineering initiatives through collaboration with international forum members to optimize development workflows and infrastructure utilization
• Establishing platform reliability standards and implementing SRE best practices across the development ecosystem
• Enhanced Observability: Implemented a comprehensive monitoring system using Prometheus, Grafana, Telegraf, InfluxDB, and Podman to gain deeper visibility into system health, performance, and resource utilization. This initiative improved our ability to identify and troubleshoot issues proactively, optimize existing systems, and validate architectural assumptions
• Containerization: Implemented and evaluated containerization technologies like Kubernetes (OKD) for modern application deployment and potential migration of legacy applications

Zywave, inc.
Linux Engineer | 2022 - 2023

• Successfully executed migration of over 90 CentOS servers to Ubuntu 20.04, including production Kubernetes servers.
• Streamlined and automated on-premise server provisioning by leveraging Ansible, resulting in a significant reduction in server build times from hours to minutes.
• Implemented Imperva Cloud WAF using Imperva API/Terraform/Console for securing Zywave's products, ensuring security compliance.
• Optimized DNS management by automating cleanup of 1400+ DNS entries using PowerShell and Azure DNS. Developed Python scripts to streamline data center migrations from on-prem to hybrid environments, leveraging Imperva's API. for DNS zone updates

Government IT Contractor - Various Agencies
Help Desk Tier I - Tier III / System Administrator | 05/2021 - 07/2022

Facing the challenges of re-entering the tech industry after an extended career break, I strategically relaunched my career through a help desk role. By rapidly progressing from tier I to tier III support, I effectively demonstrated my existing technical expertise and critical soft skills. This strategic approach enabled me to secure a Linux Engineer position and ultimately advance to my current role as a Lead Systems Engineer in a short time frame.

• Configured Active Directory, managing user profiles, groups, and policies.
• Deployed Zscaler machines to provide secure company access inmplementing ZeroTrust.
• Implemented software deployment using IBM Bigfix, resulting in improved efficiency and significant error reduction.

Self Employed
Independent Contractor | 04/2011 - Present

• Formed Smiggiddy, LLC early 2021.
• Led the infrastructure design and deployment for Smiggiddy, LLC. utilizing infrastructure as code (IaC) principles with Terraform and Ansible. Automated infrastructure provisioning across diverse cloud providers (AWS, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, Linode) and on-premises virtualization environments (Proxmox/XCP-ng).
• Since, 2013, I've Embarked on a fulfilling musical journey as a professional bassist. While immersed in the creative arts, I maintained a keen interest in technology, staying updated on industry trends and expanding my technical skill set through personal projects. This period of exploration has fueled my return to the tech industry with renewed focus and determination.

U.S. Dept. of Agriculture
IT Specialist | 07/2011 - 09/2013

• Resolved complex Tier III and Tier II support incidents for over 1,000 end users, encompassing desktop, hardware, printer, and mobile device issues.
• Delivered exceptional technical support to high-profile VIP clients, ensuring optimal system performance and user satisfaction.
• Led a team in a successful Windows XP to Windows 7 migration for 1,200+ workstations, optimizing system efficiency and security.
• Implemented efficient IT processes through device imaging, software deployment, hardware upgrades, and asset management.

Cloud resume
Inspired by cloudresumechallenge.dev | 2023 - Present

• Created by leveraging IaC, AWS S3, Lambda, DynamoDB, IAM, API Gateway
• Terraform and GitLab CI

Homelab
Building all the things | 2020 - Present

Developing Fun | What I'm Up to

• 8 node OrangePi 5 cluster. Full GitOps utilizing ArgoCD Repo
• TheOdinProject - Work on FrontEnd Dev Skills

GitOps | 2022 - present

• Everything IaC in the lab and different cloud venders (OCI/AWS/Linode/Digital Ocean)
• Utilize Ansible, Terraform, Pulimi (testing), GitLab CI
• Blog post series at Smig.tech

Vanilla Kubernetes clusters | 2022

• switched to XCP-ng (xen hypervisor)
• provisioned Vanilla k8s servers to prepare for CKA/CKS cert and to self host ArgoCD, Hashicorp Vault, Nginx ingress controller, etc
• Use PFSense VM in the lab to create a private network for the k8s environment"
• Kubernetes the hard way

Python Apps | 2021

• Achieved Google Automation cert with Python
• Wrote systems report scripts and other automations using newly aquired python skills.

Ubuntu - KVM Host | 2020

• headless ubuntu 20.04 KVM host for virtual machines
• deployed multiple VMs using virsh. Linux/Windows VMs