Systems & Applications Administrator

Systems & Applications Administrator

Contract Type: Full-time, Permanent
Salary: €50,000-€60,000 per annum

To be considered for this role, you must currently hold the legal right to work and live in Ireland. We do not provide sponsorship for work permits, either for this vacancy or any future employment. All relevant working permits/visas must be up to date and verified upon application.

At Portobello Institute, our mission is to make education accessible, relevant, and responsive, empowering each learner to reach their potential.

As a Systems & Applications Administrator, you will take technical and operational ownership of the Institute’s core systems and applications. This includes ensuring reliable, secure, and efficient services that support learners, teaching, and daily operations. You will administer connected learning, student, identity, and productivity platforms, resolve technical issues, maintain accurate configurations, and safeguard the integrity of learner records and business processes.

Your responsibilities will also involve investigating and resolving system issues, developing and maintaining scripts and automation, and contributing to integrations, testing, and technical improvements under the direction of the Technical Delivery Manager. This role requires technical ownership, problem-solving, analytical thinking, collaboration, initiative, and a commitment to delivering reliable services with integrity and professionalism.

Key Responsibilities

1. Systems Administration and Operational Reliability
   • Administer and monitor core platforms including Microsoft 365, Entra ID, Moodle ePortobello, and Classter.
   • Maintain dependable operation across technical dependencies.
   • Administer Linux and cloud hosting services supporting the learning environment.
   • Manage application services, file permissions, scheduled tasks, runtime dependencies, and logs.
   • Investigate problems across application, database, and hosting layers.
   • Establish and maintain monitoring and alerts for service health, integration activity, performance, and capacity.
   • Investigate failures using logs and metrics (HTTP, DNS, connectivity, certificate issues) and act on risks.
   • Plan and implement approved patches, application upgrades, and hosting changes using test environments.
   • Validate compatibility and downstream effects, maintaining tested backup, restore, and rollback arrangements.
2. Identity, Access, and Security Operations
   • Manage staff and learner accounts, licenses, groups, and permissions through onboarding, role changes, and offboarding.
   • Maintain consistent access across Entra ID, Microsoft 365, and connected platforms.
   • Diagnose provisioning, identity matching, single sign-on, and access propagation issues.
   • Configure and troubleshoot application registrations, service accounts, permissions, and authentication settings.
   • Maintain credentials and certificate renewals, apply least privilege, and support access reviews.
   • Apply approved security updates and secure data-handling practices.
   • Respond promptly to suspected incidents, preserve evidence, and escalate material risks.
3. Learner Lifecycle and Digital Learning Operations
   • Support the technical operation of admissions, registration, enrollment, progression, and year-end rollover processes.
   • Validate configuration and synchronization for correct downstream access based on learner states.
   • Administer learning platform structures, roles, and enrollments.
   • Support Teams provisioning, membership, class access, recordings, and learning material permissions.
   • Coordinate readiness checks with academic and learner support colleagues.
   • Support the operation of connected assessment and learning tools, including integrations and authentication.
   • Test changes and assist colleagues in distinguishing access, configuration, and process issues.
   • Investigate exceptions across Classter, Moodle, Microsoft 365, and associated CRM or payment services.
   • Trace source records and lifecycle conditions, working with departments on approved corrections.
4. User Support and Incident Resolution
   • Own day-to-day technical support for assigned systems and applications, including routine staff IT and digital access issues.
   • Record, prioritize, and resolve requests, keeping users informed.
   • Resolve technical incidents independently using application and server logs, SQL queries, scripts, and API responses.
   • Implement and verify safe fixes, documenting corrective action to prevent recurrence.
   • Reproduce application and integration defects, assessing causes before escalation.
   • Provide diagnostic evidence, user impact, and proposed next steps to the Technical Delivery Manager or supplier.
   • Analyze recurring requests and incidents, addressing avoidable causes through configuration, guidance, or improvements.
   • Support staff device and software setup, maintaining relevant asset and license records.
5. Integration Support, Automation, and Technical Implementation
   • Maintain and troubleshoot existing integrations, scheduled jobs, workflows, serverless functions (e.g., AWS Lambda), and reporting refreshes.
   • Investigate authentication, data mapping, sequencing, and processing failures.
   • Implement approved fixes or recovery steps with checks for duplicate or incomplete processing.
   • Write, debug, and maintain production scripts and operational automation using PowerShell, Python, or comparable tools.
   • Include validation, logging, error handling, and safeguards for bulk changes, maintaining code in version control.
   • Use SQL, REST APIs, and structured data to investigate discrepancies, reconcile records, and validate system behavior.
   • Develop repeatable checks and extracts, implementing approved data corrections or bulk operations with clear validation and audit records.
   • Implement defined components of integrations, workflows, and application improvements.
   • Contribute to testing, deployment, and defect resolution, establishing monitoring, support, and recovery arrangements.
6. Documentation, Service Improvement, and Professional Practice
   • Maintain current configuration records, runbooks, access records, change logs, and troubleshooting guides.
   • Capture dependencies and known failure modes for service operation and recovery by technical colleagues.
   • Collaborate with the LEDI Team Lead and departmental colleagues on clear support routes, SOPs, and user guidance.
   • Share knowledge to help staff use systems confidently and reduce workarounds.
   • Propose and deliver agreed operational improvements to reduce effort, strengthen resilience, or improve user experience.
   • Evaluate useful platform features and tools within approved priorities and safeguards.
   • Manage the operational queue, maintenance, support, and technical implementation commitments with the Technical Delivery Manager.
   • Prioritize requests by impact and urgency, protect time for planned improvements, and raise capacity pressures.
   • Follow agreed approval and escalation arrangements for significant changes.

Additional responsibilities may include:

• Collaborating with internal teams and stakeholders.
• Maintaining accurate records, data, and documentation.
• Contributing to continuous improvement and effective ways of working.
• Demonstrating behaviors aligned with Portobello’s values.

Essential Qualifications & Experience

• A degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, or a related technical discipline, or equivalent substantial professional experience.
• Strong practical experience administering and supporting live organizational systems, resolving technical incidents, and implementing reliable production changes.
• Hands-on Microsoft 365 and Entra ID administration, including identity lifecycle, groups, permissions, authentication, and access across connected applications. Ability to diagnose provisioning and single sign-on problems.
• Practical Linux administration and hosted application support, including services, file permissions, scheduled tasks, runtime dependencies, and application logs. Sound understanding of HTTP, DNS, connectivity, and certificates for troubleshooting.
• Experience administering cloud-hosted services on AWS, Azure, or equivalent platforms (compute, storage, access control, monitoring, backups, tested recovery). Ability to assess operational dependencies.
• Demonstrated experience writing, debugging, and maintaining production scripts or automation using PowerShell, Python, or a comparable language. Ability to explain validation, logging, error handling, and safeguards for bulk changes.
• Practical SQL capability, including joins, validation queries, and reconciliation of records. Experience working with structured data to investigate discrepancies and produce accurate, repeatable checks or extracts.
• Hands-on experience using REST APIs, JSON, and service authentication to investigate integration behavior or implement defined changes. Understanding of identifiers, mappings, sequencing, and risks of failed processing.
• Experience using Git or equivalent version control, delivering changes through testing, review, deployment, and rollback arrangements. Application of access controls and secure data handling.
• Experience managing support requests and vendor cases, documenting technical solutions, and explaining issues clearly to non-technical colleagues.

Desirable Qualifications & Experience

• Moodle administration, including course structures, enrollments, roles, plugins, and learning platform upgrades; Linux and PHP application support.
• Student information systems, HubSpot or other CRM platforms, and operational dependencies between admissions, learning, and finance systems.
• Specific experience with AWS EC2, S3, IAM, Lambda, and CloudWatch, including application monitoring, environment cloning, and restore testing.
• Hybrid Active Directory / Entra environments, Microsoft Graph, and advanced Teams or SharePoint administration.
• Building or maintaining Power Automate workflows, supporting Power BI refreshes, and working with scheduled or serverless integration services.
• Relevant professional certification in Microsoft 365, identity, cloud administration, or service management.
• Experience in an education or learner services environment.

Skills & Competencies

• Technical and Operational Ownership: Investigate, implement, and verify solutions, maintaining dependable services.
• Analytical Problem-Solving: Test assumptions against logs and data, understand dependencies, and distinguish technical faults.
• Technical Judgment: Choose proportionate remedies, recognize authority limits, and seek specialist input.
• Service Focus: Respond calmly and professionally, understand impact, and explain next steps clearly.
• Prioritization and Collaboration: Balance incidents, maintenance, and delivery, making trade-offs clear.
• Accuracy and Professional Discipline: Maintain careful records, validate changes, and uphold confidentiality.
• Learning and Improvement: Build technical depth, explain choices, and turn problems into maintainable improvements.

About Portobello Institute

Portobello Institute is committed to making education accessible to a wide student body. We are a small Institute with big ambitions and a strong student-centered focus. Our size allows us to nurture each student and team member. Our culture is collaborative, agile, and supportive, suited to high-performing individuals who want to grow their careers. We pride ourselves on doing the right thing and working together to deliver meaningful outcomes for students and colleagues.

Equal Opportunities

Portobello Institute is an equal opportunities employer. We welcome applications from all suitably qualified candidates and are committed to creating an inclusive, values-driven, and respectful workplace.

Job Types: Full-time, Permanent
Pay: €50,000.00-€60,000.00 per year
Benefits: Flexitime, Work from home
Work authorisation: Ireland (required)
Work Location: Hybrid remote in Dublin, County Dublin

Application Questions

1. Do you have hands-on experience administering Microsoft 365 and Entra ID in a live production environment, including identities, groups, permissions, enterprise applications, single sign-on, and troubleshooting access or provisioning issues? (Yes/No)?
2. Describe a production issue you personally diagnosed and resolved involving two or more connected systems. Which systems were involved, and what specific log finding, SQL query, API response, or other evidence established the root cause? Explain one plausible cause you ruled out, what you changed, and how you verified the resolution across the affected systems?
3. Describe a script or automation you personally built and used in production to reduce recurring manual work. Explain the tools you used and how it selected or matched the correct accounts or records. Describe one actual failure or edge case you encountered and the safeguard you implemented. Explain how you handled the risk of duplicate or incomplete changes and what evidence showed that the automation improved the original process?
4. Describe a Linux-hosted or cloud-hosted application incident you personally diagnosed and resolved involving poor performance, intermittent availability, or service failure. Identify the application and hosting environment, and explain one specific command, log finding, or monitoring result that helped establish the cause. What recovery action did you take, how did you verify the service was working correctly, and what did you change to reduce the risk of recurrence?