Microsoft 365 Architect

Exchange Online / Exchange Server hybrid, SharePoint Online, OneDrive, Power Platform, Purview, SendGrid, Exclaimer

Role Summary The M365 Architect owns the end-to-end design authority for the customer's Microsoft 365 estate across collaboration, messaging, content services, compliance and low-code automation. The role is accountable for architecture decisions, design documentation, standards and governance, and for driving L3 escalations that require design-level intervention. This is a client-facing onsite role that partners with the customer's IT leadership, security and infrastructure teams, and leads the offshore L3 engineering pod.

Position Details

Field

Detail

Role Title

Microsoft 365 Architect

Tower

M365 / Modern Workplace - L3 Design & Architecture

Location / Model

Onsite at client location

Shift

Business hours aligned to CST, with on-call participation for P1/P2 and change windows

Experience

12+ years in IT infrastructure, of which 6+ years in Microsoft 365 architecture and migrations

Reports To

Service Delivery Manager / Tower Lead

Team Interface

L1/L1.5 Service Desk, L2 Operations, offshore L3 pod, client security, network and identity teams

Key Responsibilities

Architecture and Design

- Own the target-state architecture for Exchange (Online and on-premises hybrid), SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, Teams file/collaboration integration, Power Platform and Purview.
- Produce and maintain HLD/LLD, design decision records, as-built documentation, standards and reference patterns; secure client architecture review board approval.
- Define tenant configuration baselines, governance guardrails and lifecycle policies for sites, teams, groups, guests and external sharing.
- Assess and remediate technical debt: legacy Exchange servers, public folders, unsupported clients, orphaned sites, oversized OneDrive estates.
- Conduct design reviews and provide sign-off on changes classified as high-risk or architecturally significant.

Messaging - Exchange and Mail Flow

- Design and govern hybrid Exchange topology, mail routing, connectors, Autodiscover, free/busy and cross-forest coexistence.
- Own mail hygiene and transport architecture: Exchange Online Protection, Defender for Office 365 policies, anti-spam/anti-phish, transport rules, journaling.
- Design and govern SPF, DKIM and DMARC records and enforcement posture across all sending domains, including third-party senders.
- Own application/relay mail architecture including SendGrid: domain authentication, dedicated IPs, sub-user and API key model, suppression lists, deliverability and bounce management, IP warm-up and reputation monitoring.
- Own enterprise email signature and disclaimer management through Exclaimer: template design, AD attribute mapping, campaign banners, rules by department/region, and integration with Exchange Online transport or client-side deployment.
- Define mailbox provisioning standards, shared/resource mailbox models, retention and archiving (including migration off legacy archive platforms).

Content Services - SharePoint and OneDrive

- Architect SharePoint Online information architecture: hub/site topology, navigation, metadata, search, content types and term store.
- Design file-share and legacy SharePoint on-premises migration strategy and tooling (ShareGate, Migration Manager, Mover) including sizing, throttling, cutover and validation.
- Define OneDrive Known Folder Move, sync client policy, storage quotas, retention on leaver accounts and offboarding data handling.
- Define permissions model, sharing controls, sensitivity-label driven site protection and access review process.

Compliance - Microsoft Purview

- Design and implement sensitivity labels and auto-labelling, DLP policies across Exchange, SharePoint, OneDrive, Teams and endpoints.
- Design retention labels and policies, records management, litigation hold and eDiscovery (Premium) workflows with Legal and HR.
- Implement Insider Risk Management, Communication Compliance and Audit (Premium) where in scope; define alert triage and escalation into the service desk.
- Map control requirements from regulatory and customer security frameworks to Purview configuration and evidence artefacts.

Power Platform

- Define Power Platform governance: environment strategy, DLP connector policies, Managed Environments, CoE Starter Kit adoption, licensing and capacity management.
- Provide design guidance and code/solution review for Power Apps, Power Automate flows and Dataverse usage; establish ALM using solutions and pipelines.
- Identify and shepherd automation opportunities that reduce service desk and operational ticket volume.

Operations, L3 Escalation and Governance

- Act as final technical escalation point for M365 P1/P2 incidents; lead root cause analysis and drive permanent fix through problem management.
- Chair the M365 CAB input: review and approve RFCs, define rollback plans, validate blast radius.
- Own Message Center and roadmap change impact assessment; publish a rolling change calendar to the client.
- Define monitoring, alerting and service health reporting for the M365 estate; establish SLA/KPI measures and report in monthly service reviews.
- Create and maintain SOPs and knowledge articles; drive shift-left of repeatable L3 tasks to L2 and L1.5.




- Mentor L2/L3 engineers and act as design authority for project and M&A; workstreams (tenant-to-tenant migrations, divestitures, acquisitions).

Required Technical Skills

Domain

Skills

Level

Exchange

Exchange Online, Exchange Server 2016/2019 hybrid, HCW, mail flow and transport rules, EOP/Defender for O365, migration (cutover, staged, hybrid, third-party tooling)

Expert

Email Authentication

SPF, DKIM, DMARC, MTA-STS, TLS enforcement, deliverability troubleshooting

Expert

SendGrid

Domain authentication, dedicated IP and warm-up, API/SMTP relay integration, event webhooks, suppression and bounce handling

Advanced

Exclaimer

Exclaimer Cloud for Microsoft 365, signature templates, AD/Entra attribute mapping, rules, server-side vs client-side deployment

Advanced

SharePoint / OneDrive

SPO information architecture, hub sites, search, permissions, sync client policy, KFM, SPMT/ShareGate/Migration Manager

Expert

Purview

Sensitivity and retention labels, DLP, eDiscovery, records management, Insider Risk, Audit

Advanced

Power Platform

Power Apps, Power Automate, Dataverse, environment and DLP governance, CoE Kit, ALM

Advanced

Identity

Entra ID, Conditional Access, Entra Connect, SSO, app registrations, RBAC and PIM

Advanced

Automation

PowerShell (Exchange Online, PnP, MS Graph SDK), Microsoft Graph API, scripted reporting and bulk operations

Advanced

Endpoint / Adjacent

Intune policy interaction with M365 apps, Teams (incl. voice awareness), Defender for Endpoint integration

Working

Service Management

ITIL incident, problem, change and request management; ServiceNow

Advanced

Certifications

Required (one or more)

- MS-102 Microsoft 365 Administrator Expert
- MS-203 Microsoft 365 Messaging Administrator Associate

Preferred:
- SC-400 Information Protection and Compliance Administrator
- SC-300 Identity and Access Administrator
- PL-600 Power Platform Solution Architect
- MS-700 Teams Administrator, TOGAF or equivalent architecture certification

Soft Skills and Behaviours
- Able to present and defend architecture decisions to client CIO/CISO and architecture review boards.
- Strong written communication - design documents, decision records and executive summaries.
- Comfortable operating in a multi-vendor environment and driving outcomes without direct authority.
- Bias for standardisation, automation and documentation over tribal knowledge.

Critical Success Factors
- Approved target-state M365 architecture and design baseline within the first 90 days.
- Zero unplanned mail flow or collaboration outages arising from design or change defects.
- Measurable reduction in recurring L3 escalations through problem management and shift-left.
- Purview control coverage and evidence accepted by the client security and compliance function.
- Design sign-off cycle time and change success rate meeting agreed SLA/KPI thresholds.

Microsoft Teams Voice Architect

Teams Phone, Direct Routing, Operator Connect, contact centre integration and voice operations

Role Summary The Teams Voice Architect owns the design, migration and operational integrity of the enterprise voice platform on Microsoft Teams. The role covers PSTN connectivity strategy, SBC and session border design, dial plan and numbering architecture, emergency calling compliance, Teams Rooms and device estate, contact centre and CCaaS integration, and voice quality management. The architect leads legacy PBX/Skype for Business decommissioning and is the escalation authority for voice incidents.

Position Details

Field

Detail

Role Title

Microsoft Teams Voice / Voice Architect

Tower

M365 / Contemporary Workplace - Voice & Collaboration (L3 Design & Architecture)

Location / Model

Onsite at client location

Shift

Business hours aligned to CST; out-of-hours support for cutovers, porting windows and P1 voice incidents

Experience

10+ years in unified communications, of which 5+ years designing and delivering Teams Phone at enterprise scale

Reports To

Service Delivery Manager / Tower Lead

Team Interface

M365 Architect, network and security teams, telco carriers, SBC vendor, contact centre owners, site facilities teams

Key Responsibilities

Voice Architecture and PSTN Strategy

- Define the enterprise voice target state and PSTN connectivity model - Microsoft Calling Plans, Operator Connect, Teams Phone Mobile and Direct Routing - including per-country selection based on regulation, carrier availability and cost.
- Design SBC architecture (AudioCodes, Ribbon, Oracle or equivalent): high availability, media bypass, local media optimisation, SIP trunk sizing, TLS/SRTP, failover and survivability for branch sites.
- Own numbering strategy: number ranges, DID inventory, porting plans (LOA, carrier coordination, porting windows), service numbers and number lifecycle management.
- Design dial plans, normalisation rules, voice routing policies, PSTN usages, least-cost routing and toll-fraud controls.
- Define Teams voice policy framework: calling policies, caller ID policies, call park, call queues, auto attendants,



voicemail and shared line appearance / delegation.

Emergency Calling and Compliance

- Design emergency calling architecture including agile emergency addresses, LIS (subnets, WAPs, switches/ports), ELIN gateways and country-specific requirements.
- Ensure compliance with regulatory obligations such as Kari's Law, RAY BAUM's Act and equivalent regional mandates; maintain evidence and test records.
- Define security notification and on-site routing behaviour with facilities and security teams.

Migration and Legacy Decommissioning

- Lead migration from legacy PBX, Skype for Business, Avaya, Cisco CUCM or Mitel platforms to Teams Phone, including coexistence and interop design during transition.
- Build site-by-site cutover runbooks, pilot plans, hypercare model, rollback criteria and decommissioning schedule.
- Handle analogue and specialist endpoints - fax, lifts, alarms, paging, overhead, door phones - through ATA, SIP gateway or third-party services.

Contact Centre and Integration

- Design integration with contact centre / CCaaS platforms (Genesys, NICE, Five9, Anywhere365 or Teams-certified Connect/Extend/Power models), including routing, presence and recording flows.
- Define compliance call recording architecture and retention alignment with Purview where in scope.
- Support voice AI / IVR and CSAT initiatives: design call flows, prompts, integration points, prerequisites and data capture for automation and analytics.

Devices, Rooms and Quality

- Define standards for Teams Phones, headsets, Teams Rooms (Windows and Android), Teams Panels and peripherals; own firmware, configuration profiles and Teams Rooms Pro management.
- Own network readiness for voice: QoS/DSCP marking, port and firewall requirements, split tunnelling for VPN, bandwidth planning and site assessments.
- Establish voice quality management using Call Quality Dashboard, Call Analytics and Quality of Experience reviews; drive remediation of poor-call sites.

Operations and Governance

- Act as L3 escalation authority for voice incidents; lead RCA with carriers, SBC vendor and Microsoft support.
- Approve voice-related changes, maintain design documentation, as-builts and configuration baselines.
- Define monitoring and alerting for SBCs, trunks and voice services; report on SLA/KPI performance including call success rate, poor call percentage and mean time to restore.
- Produce SOPs and knowledge articles enabling L1/L2 to handle routine voice requests (number assignment, call queue changes, device swaps) and drive shift-left.

Required Technical Skills

Domain

Skills

Level

Teams Phone

Teams Phone System, Calling Plans, Operator Connect, Teams Phone Mobile, Direct Routing, voice policies and policy packages

Expert

SIP / SBC

AudioCodes or Ribbon SBC configuration, SIP signalling and troubleshooting, media bypass, local media optimisation, codecs, TLS/SRTP

Expert

Dial Plan / Numbering

Dial plan design, normalisation and translation rules, PSTN usage and voice routes, DID management, number porting

Expert

Emergency Calling

Dynamic E911, LIS configuration, ELIN, Kari's Law and RAY BAUM's Act compliance, regional emergency requirements

Advanced

Call Flows

Auto attendants, call queues, resource accounts, holidays, overflow and timeout handling, voicemail

Expert

Contact Centre

CCaaS integration models, Anywhere365 / Genesys / NICE / Five9, compliance recording, IVR and voice AI enablement

Advanced

Devices / Rooms

Teams Rooms on Windows and Android, Teams Panels, certified phones and headsets, Teams Rooms Pro Management, firmware lifecycle

Advanced

Network

QoS/DSCP, SIP and RTP port requirements, firewall and proxy, SD-WAN and VPN split tunnelling, bandwidth planning

Advanced

Quality / Analytics

Call Quality Dashboard, Call Analytics, Power BI CQD templates, trend and remediation reporting

Advanced

Automation

PowerShell (MicrosoftTeams module), Microsoft Graph, bulk provisioning and automated number assignment

Advanced

Legacy UC

Skype for Business, Cisco CUCM, Avaya, Mitel interop and migration

Working to Advanced

Service Management

ITIL incident, problem and change management; ServiceNow

Advanced

Certifications

Required

- MS-721 Collaboration Communications Systems Engineer
- MS-700 Microsoft Teams Administrator Associate

Preferred:
- AudioCodes or Ribbon SBC vendor certification
- MS-102 Microsoft 365 Administrator Expert
- Contact centre platform certification relevant to the client estate

Soft Skills and Behaviours
- Able to run cutover bridges under pressure and communicate clearly to business stakeholders during outages.
- Strong carrier and vendor management skills - porting, escalations and contractual obligations.
- Disciplined about runbooks, test scripts and evidence; treats voice as a life-safety-adjacent service.
- Comfortable working with site leadership across regions and time zones.

Critical Success Factors
- Approved voice target-state design and per-country PSTN model agreed with the client.
- Site cutovers delivered on schedule with zero missed porting windows and no post-cutover P1s attributable to design.
- Emergency calling compliance validated and evidenced for every in-scope site.
- Poor call rate maintained below the agreed threshold, with a demonstrable downward trend.
- Legacy PBX estate decommissioned to the agreed timeline, with associated cost takeout realised.

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