Summary
Overview
Work History
Education
Skills
Certification
Key Projects Handled
Timeline
Generic

Hameed Syed

Chicago,USA

Summary

Accomplished Senior Systems Administrator with expertise in Azure Cloud Services and VMware ESXi, previously at Hub International Limited. Proven track record in optimizing cloud infrastructure, enhancing system performance, and driving efficiency. Skilled in problem-solving and collaboration, delivering solutions that exceed expectations and support strategic goals. Successfully managed over 10,000 servers.

Overview

12
12
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification

Work History

Senior Systems Administrator/Cloud Engineer

Hub International Limited
Chicago, USA
04.2023 - Current
  • Maintain and administer Sara Lee's computer network devices and associated IT environments including hardware, systems software, applications software, and all configurations.
  • Involvement in a series of project related functional and technical discussions with Subject Matter Experts to understand the project requirements & provide inputs on the design to Windows server & Azure Cloud platforms, Citrix Architects & work towards the solution of the infrastructure Design along with Architects.
  • Monitored, diagnosed, troubleshot, and resolved hardware, software, and network issues in AWS, Azure cloud environments, and Citrix applications.
  • Monitor Troubleshoot network, storage & Server performance issues to identify if there is a need for replacement and also to determine future changes that should be implemented across Sara Lee's US & Canada offices.
  • Monitored automated alerts from Solarwinds, SCOM, AWS CloudWatch, and VMware tools to interpret and resolve problems; addressed user-reported issues via email with appropriate actions.
  • Analyzed and resolved software and hardware problems while following the correct processes in change management for tracking.
  • Review & recommend changes in IT infrastructure to improve systems and network configurations and determine hardware or software requirements related to such changes.
  • Deploy & configure machines in VMware, Azure & Amazon Web Services cloud environment (AWS) which includes Windows Server OS support (Server 2008, 2008R2, 2012, 2016 & 2019, 2022) as per the project requirements and install necessary applications or open network ports on the AWS security groups which acts as firewall.
  • Provide 3rd level user support of Email/Exchange 2010, Lync 2010/Skype, and Office 365 environment.
  • Created AD user service accounts and troubleshot user login and lockout issues to facilitate seamless access for end users.
  • Manage MIM (Microsoft Identity Manager) used for automation of user on-boarding and off boarding.
  • Manage domain users via Active Directory (AD) tools and configure AD Group policies & Citrix policies to secure and customize the end user experience on Desktops & Servers.
  • Assist in the administration of SolarWinds 2010/2016 for monitoring.
  • Assist in the deployment of Monthly server patches via SCCM 2012 on all the windows servers. Configure monthly Microsoft windows security updates via SCCM in QA and Production environment.
  • Configure and Manage SCCM end point protection for servers against different viruses & attacks.
  • Manage SSL certificates via Hydrant portal for securing the websites. Perform weekly check and work with application teams to renew or commission the certificates which are getting expired.
  • Implement network security processes to protect Sara Lee's data, systems, software, and hardware.
  • Enable system, application & security logs/Auditing & gather data pertaining to customer needs, & use the information to identify, predict & interpret the logs when needed.
  • Coordinate with other infrastructure teams like Network, Storage, Tools & Monitoring, Citrix and application teams during operational and implementation tasks.
  • Coordinate with multiple vendors like AWS, IPSwitch, IBM Hardware, Application, Citrix & Microsoft vendors during troubleshooting or implementation activities.
  • Executed data backups and disaster recovery operations, coordinating with multiple teams during DR tests to ensure rapid environment recovery.
  • Confer with network users on the incidents created and provide a solution for the problems. Contact users if the issues are repeating again and make sure to provide a permanent fix.
  • Troubleshoot end user Outlook/Email, server & application issues and provide the technical support via phone or remote connectivity tools like LogMeIn.
  • Use tools like Splunk for account lockouts, Dome9 for AWS security groups, Citrix Director, SCOM, Wireshark to monitor the Citrix servers, Network utilization for end users and also capture Data for troubleshooting purpose.
  • Manage and troubleshoot user profile issues via Citrix User Profile Management tool.
  • Use Remote connectivity tools like Putty, Psexec, Logmein, RDP, Citrix Director to troubleshoot.
  • Responsible to do RCA’s (Root Cause Analysis) for major incidents & prepare RCA reports and perform daily health checks and take necessary actions.
  • Involve in setup test environment for testing changes to production environments.
  • Automated manual processes to increase efficiency.
  • Create Knowledge base articles for repetitive issues and upload in KB portal.
  • Explore new tools, technologies and solutions by attending seminars or taking classes, and implement or recommend the implementation of new technologies.
  • Follow the ITIL best practices while handling incident, problem & Change management processes and also making sure that following the customer defined process.
  • Preparation of Rollout plans and support during implementation phase. Fixing the bugs/issues identified after the deployed in Production.
  • Design, configure, and test computer hardware, networking software, Vendor applications and operating system (O/S) software. Performing tasks related to AWS and application security, test and deploy O/S & Citrix hot-fixes, firmware updates for servers. Manage & provision new physical & virtual servers for expanding the current AWS, Azure and VMware environment.
  • Gather, analyze, define and document functional requirements from end customers, business stakeholders and creating High Level & Detail Design Specifications.
  • Provide monthly on-call support for the AWS Cloud and Azure Cloud, Windows, Citrix and VMware deployed in Production and resolved all related issues that are raised in this Environment to increase efficiency.
  • Identify unused resources in on-prem and in AWS Cloud environment and work on cost optimization activities to decommission them.
  • HUB International Limited is an insurance brokerage providing an array of property, casualty, risk management, life and health, employee benefits, investment, and wealth management products and services across North America. HUB has more than 375 offices across the United States and Canada and more than 10,000 employees. It is based in Chicago, Illinois.
  • Outlined Azure responsibilities in detail.
  • Implement high availability with Azure Resource Manager deployment models.
  • Design & Implement Network Security Groups (NSGs) to control inbound and outbound access to network interfaces (NICs), VMs and subnets.
  • Setup Azure Virtual Appliances (VMs) to meet security requirements as software based appliance functions (firewall, WAN optimization and intrusion detections).
  • Leverage VNET system routes and underlying route table that holds Local VNet Rules, On-premise Rules, Internet Rules and IP Forwarding as design basis.
  • Design User Defined Routes with custom route tables for specific cases to force tunneling to the Internet via on-premise network and control use of virtual appliances in the customer’s Azure environment.
  • Associate routes with VNets via the route table per relationship constraints.
  • Manage IP Forwarding for VMs and role instances acting as virtual appliances.
  • Review and Understand Sara Lee's’ overall compute environment and work on design & implementation of Microsoft and 3rd party architectures and solutions.
  • Implement solutions that meet business requirements & build cloud transformation using Azure tools.
  • Apply application architecture principals to help customer build modernization scenarios.
  • Develop relationships with key customer IT decision makers, who drive long-term cloud adoption within the company to enable them to be cloud advocates.
  • Maintain and advance technical skills and knowledge, keeping up to date with market trends and insights, and share within the technical community.
  • Assess the Customers' knowledge of Azure platform and overall cloud readiness to support customers through a structured plan and ensure its delivery.
  • Solid understanding of Microsoft Azure technologies, with the technical capability and experience to learn new technologies and understand relevant cloud trends.
  • Having strong technical experience and knowledge, with depth in three or more of the following areas: Governance, Security, Networking, DevOps and Service Cataloging (PaaS/IaaS/SaaS).
  • Designed and configured Azure Virtual Networks (VNets), subnets, Azure network settings, DHCP address blocks, DNS settings, security policies and routing.
  • Deploy Azure IaaS virtual machines (VMs) and Cloud services (PaaS role instances) into secure VNets and subnets.
  • Expose Virtual machines and cloud services in the VNets to the Internet using Azure External Load Balancer.
  • Provide high availability for IaaS VMs and PaaS role instances for access from other services in the VNet with Azure Internal LoadBalancer.
  • Have experience in Infrastructure as code.

Systems Administrator

Walgreens
Deerfield, USA
07.2019 - 03.2023
  • Managed 10,000+ servers, including Windows 2012, 2016, 2022 and VMware ESXi 5.0, 5.5, Citrix XenApp 7.0, 7.6, and Xendesktop 7.6, ensuring optimal performance and availability.
  • Install / Configure & manage Netscaler infrastructure (SDX, VPX appliances).
  • Manage Netscaler & access gateway for implementing policies based on roles, devices & networks.
  • Install / Configure Citrix Presentation/XenApp Servers 4.5/5.0/7.0/ 7.5/7.6 servers.
  • Install / publish applications & Desktops on Citrix servers.
  • Provision new physical & virtual servers and install Citrix on them for expansion of Citrix farms.
  • Performed activities related to Citrix and application security. Tested and deployed OS and Citrix hot fixes, firmware updates for HP servers.
  • Remotely troubleshoot servers ILO/RAC/V Center in case of issues.
  • Plan for monthly windows patching & implement them via HPSA tool.
  • Install, configure & manage ESXi hosts &VM’s.
  • Configure Networking, SAN Storage, Host profiles and provide security permissions on VC/ESX.
  • Monitoring the performance of VM's & ESX Host.
  • Working on P2V migration using different tools.
  • Participate in DR drills.
  • Attend Incident & change management calls & represent the team.
  • Conducted root cause analysis for major incidents to identify underlying issues.
  • Configure backups via NetBackup, Avamar for both data & virtual machines.
  • Automate the manual activities whenever possible.
  • Coordinate with offshore/onsite & other infrastructure teams like Network/Storage/Tools & Monitoring teams.
  • Handled IIS, DFS, and NTFS file and folder security issues, executed file server migrations, and resolved file share troubleshooting to maintain data integrity.
  • Perform daily health checks and take necessary actions.
  • Manage offshore team and handle escalations and act as an interface between client and Wipro teams.
  • Automated tasks using Bladelogic and PowerShell scripts, enhancing operational efficiency and reducing manual workload.
  • Automated tasks using Bladelogic and PowerShell scripts, enhancing operational efficiency and reducing manual workload.

Systems Administrator

Tate & Lyle
Hoffman Estates, USA
05.2014 - 06.2018
  • Installed, configured, and updated the XenApp 7.0, Xendesktop 7.6, and Xenserver 6.2 environments.
  • Install, configure & Administer Storefront, Web Interface servers and add them to load balancing for redundancy.
  • Install, configure & Administer Citrix License Server & RD/ Terminal License Server.
  • Install, configure & manage Liquid Ware’s Profile Unity Environment for profile management.
  • Publishing application on Citrix servers.
  • Managed user access to applications by implementing security protocols.
  • Conducted regular cleanup of system resources, enhancing overall system performance.
  • Executed security measures for Citrix and applications to protect data integrity.
  • Monitored health of Citrix servers and hosted applications, ensuring optimal performance and availability.
  • Monitor, optimize and troubleshoot printing and printing policies.
  • Provisioning new physical & virtual servers and installing Citrix on them for expansion of Citrix farms.
  • Setup test environment for testing changes to Citrix production environments.
  • Performed routine reporting activities on Citrix servers and hosted applications, supporting proactive system management.
  • Configuring policies over the farm for printers, Client devices, printing, etc.
  • Performing activities relating to Citrix and application security and Test and deploy OS & Citrix hot fixes, firmware updates.
  • Deploying ICA client, printer driver mapping, shadowing users, checking sessions, managing server load and CPU utilization.
  • Maintenance and troubleshooting of Citrix Server farm running presentation servers.
  • Performed various tasks related to VMware and Windows server management.
  • Installing / Configuration of ESX, VM’s.
  • Installing and Configuring Virtual Centers.
  • Install and configure Windows & LINUX Servers on Standalone and VM’s in ESX FARM Server using clone.
  • Creating & Managing VMFS / VMDK partitions, Migration activities include (Cold & Cloning Migration).
  • Configuring the ESX Host for redundancy which includes configuring DRS & HA.
  • Patching ESX Boxes.
  • Configure Networking, SAN Storage, Host profiles and provide security permissions on VC/ESX.
  • Configuring VC’s, maintaining Licenses.
  • Install/Upgrade VMware tools.
  • Taking Snapshot of Virtual Machines (for backup & testing purposes), Using Motioning, Cloning of Virtual Machines, Creating New Virtual Switches, and New Port Groups etc.
  • Monitoring the performance of VM's & ESX Host (CPU, RAM, HDD utilization).
  • Working on P2V migration using different tools.
  • Build Windows 2003/2008 servers and perform server hardening.
  • Remotely troubleshoot servers ILO/RAC/VCenter in case of issues.
  • Install patches on the servers via HPSA automated tool.

Education

Master of Science - Information Technology

LTU
01-2011

Skills

  • Azure Cloud Services
  • IaaS
  • PaaS
  • VM Migrations
  • VNet
  • Traffic Manager
  • SQL Azure
  • Active Directory
  • Data Factory
  • Data Lake
  • HDInsights
  • ExpressRoute
  • PowerShell
  • Security Center
  • Service bus
  • Blob Storage
  • Azure AD Connect
  • VMware ESXI
  • Citrix VDI
  • Xenapp
  • Amazon Webservices
  • DevOps
  • Windows Server 2022
  • Windows Cluster Server
  • SQL Server
  • IIS Server
  • File Server
  • Exchange Server
  • Terminal Server
  • Linux Administration
  • MS Visio
  • IP Sub Subnetting
  • Office 365

Certification

• MCSA (MCITP – Server Administrator)
• Microsoft Azure - AZ 104
• AWS Certified Solutions Architect
• HP ITIL V4 Certified
Power BI - Power Platform Fundamentals

Key Projects Handled

  • Migration of servers from Vmware Cloud to ESX.
  • Completed the implementation of Xenapp 7.0 along with Citrix PVS, Edge sight, Netscaler devices for Citrix infrastructure with 60+ applications for both ADM & ITO teams.
  • Completed the implementation of Xenapp for Customer Citrix farm with Citrix PVS, Netscaler SDX devices, Edgesight, Profile Unity, Thin Print.
  • Completed the implementation of Xendesktop 7.5 for GIS environment.
  • Completed the Implementation of Xendesktop 7.5.
  • Completed the Implementation of Xenapp 7.6 along with PVS 7.6.
  • Upgrade Xendesktop 7.6 to 7.6 CU1.
  • Worked with Client Architecture team and Implement Azure & AWS environment.

Timeline

Senior Systems Administrator/Cloud Engineer

Hub International Limited
04.2023 - Current

Systems Administrator

Walgreens
07.2019 - 03.2023

Systems Administrator

Tate & Lyle
05.2014 - 06.2018

Master of Science - Information Technology

LTU

Similar Profiles

CREATE PROFILE
Hameed Syed