Systems Administrator

WHO WE ARE
Sid Lee is a multidisciplinary creative collective striving to make a difference and celebrate culture with bold ideas. Its 700 professionals work as one team from offices in Montreal, Toronto, New York, Paris, London, Los Angeles and Seattle. Their mission is to create what matters through brand building, brand expression and brand experience. Its creative community also includes Yard, Digital Kitchen, BIMM and Haigo.
Alongside progressive clients, Sid Lee draws on its rich collection of disciplines, from design to data and experiential communication and technology to advertising and architecture, empowering its clients to outperform their competitors, earn the trust of their customers and increase their influence on culture.
Sid Lee is a member of kyu, a collective of top-tier global creative companies established by Hakuhodo DY Holdings. Sid Lee also imagined C2 Montréal, one of the largest creative-business conferences in the world.

ROLE
We're seeking a seasoned Systems Administrator - L3 Support to join our Toronto team. This hands-on IT professional will balance infrastructure management with top-tier technical support, ensuring secure, reliable, and optimized systems. Operating across two local offices, this role is part of a global IT team of 17 spanning London, Paris, New York, Seattle, and Montreal.
The Systems Administrator will take ownership of our cloud platforms, office networking, endpoint security, server rooms, GPU render farms, and data center workflows, while serving as the go-to contact for Level 3 escalations. The ideal candidate is proactive, organized, highly technical, and thrives in fast-paced, collaborative environments.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Manage and administer cloud services such as Google Workspace and Microsoft 365.
• Implement and enforce endpoint security and device management using Kandji and inTunes (Mac & Windows).
• Deploy, configure, and maintain office networking infrastructure, including Wi-Fi, firewalls (Fortigate), and switches (Arista, Cisco, Mellanox, UniFi).
• Oversee two server rooms and a data center housing GPU render farms, TrueNAS systems, RAID arrays, and other workstation/server hardware.
• Operate and maintain LTO robots and archival systems managing 2.5 PB of data in alignment with data governance principles.
• Administer virtualization environments exclusively on ProxMox.
• Propose, implement, and maintain open-source monitoring solutions (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, ELK) and reliable alerting systems.
• Configure and secure VPN and firewall policies.
• Handle Level 3 escalations for complex hardware, software, and network incidents.
• Deploy and configure workstations, printers, peripherals, and meeting room AV systems (Zoom/MS Teams).
• Maintain physical office infrastructure readiness.
• Document procedures, system configurations, and troubleshooting guides for future reference.

REQUIREMENTS

• Diploma in a related field (an asset).
• A minimum of 5 years' experience in computing, IT, and/or user support.
• Strong knowledge of:
  • Cloud platforms (Google Workspace, Microsoft 365).
  • Networking (Fortigate, Arista, Cisco, Mellanox, UniFi, high-speed 10GbE+ networks).
  • Storage systems (TrueNAS, RAID, NAS, LTO).
  • Virtualization (ProxMox).
  • Operating systems (Windows, macOS, Linux).
  • Endpoint management (Kandji, inTunes).
• Experience with monitoring/logging tools and open-source observability stacks.
• Ability to diagnose and resolve data degradation issues and complex network problems.
• Skilled in GPU workstation support, server hardware troubleshooting, and AV system setup.
• Strong organizational and communication skills.
• Willingness to work on-site across two Toronto offices, with occasional travel to Montreal and Los Angeles.
• Flexibility for maintenance or urgent troubleshooting outside core hours.

Proud to be an equal opportunity employer, Sid Lee is committed to creating a diverse work environment. All qualified applicants are considered without regard to citizenship, ethnicity, race, colour, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, disability, age or veteran status.
We encourage women, Indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, and members of visible and ethnic minorities to apply for our job opportunities. Additionally, accommodation measures can be made available for persons with disabilities upon request at any stage of the pre-selection and selection process.