IT Support specialist – Middleware engineer

1. Role Summary

The Middleware Engineer – Message Queue Specialist is responsible for ensuring the stability, performance, security, and scalability of enterprise message-oriented middleware platforms used across our client’s global IT ecosystem. This role supports both on-premise and cloud-based integration services, with a primary focus on message queue technologies such as Apache ActiveMQ, RabbitMQ, IBM MQ, MSMQ, and similar broker platforms.

This role also includes responsibility for supporting and maintaining Apache Kafka environments, ensuring reliable event streaming, throughput efficiency, and platform stability.

2. Key Responsibilities

Operational Responsibilities

• Provide L2 operational support for enterprise middleware and message broker platforms across distributed and cloud environments.

• Monitor, manage, and optimize message queues, topics, brokers, routing, persistence layers, and message delivery pipelines.

• Ensure high platform availability, performance tuning, and timely resolution of incidents.

• Troubleshoot and resolve complex integration issues related to message traffic and delivery failures.

• Participate in an on-call rotation supporting production systems.

• Implement Kafka configuration improvements, partition strategies, and streaming optimizations.

• Monitor, manage, and troubleshoot Apache Kafka clusters, topics, partitions, and consumer groups.

Engineering & Continuous Improvement

• Implement automation, configuration improvements, and CI/CD integrations for middleware services.

• Identify system trends, recurring issues, and opportunities for workload reduction and modernization.

• Own small-to-medium engineering tasks improving platform stability and efficiency.

DevOps and Cloud Responsibilities

• Support middleware deployments across Kubernetes and related orchestration platforms.

• Collaborate with cloud engineering teams for Azure-hosted middleware services.

• Maintain and improve CI/CD pipelines and monitoring dashboards.

3. Required Skills and Experience

• 5–8 years of experience in Application Support or Middleware Engineering.

• Strong hands-on experience with ActiveMQ, RabbitMQ, IBM MQ, MSMQ, or similar.

• Strong proficiency in Linux/Unix administration, containers, Kubernetes.

• Familiarity with Azure cloud services preferred.

• Experience with DevOps frameworks, GitHub, automation, and monitoring tools.

− Basic experience with Kafka Connect, schema registry, or stream processing concepts is a plus.

− Ability to troubleshoot consumer lag, partition imbalances, and connectivity issues.

− Understanding of Kafka architecture, including brokers, zookeepers (if applicable), and cluster fundamentals.

− Basic to mid-level knowledge in Apache Kafka (topics, partitions, producers, consumers).

4. Core KPIs

• Platform Availability: Maintain middleware uptime > 99.9%.

• Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR): Reduce incident MTTR by at least 15% YoY.

• Automation Coverage: Increase middleware process automation by 25% within 12 months.

• Incident Reduction: Lower recurring incidents by identifying root causes and implementing systemic fixes.

5. Competency Matrix (Seniority Levels)

Competency Expected

Message Queue

Administration Working knowledge of MQ operations and troubleshooting

Linux & Containers Proficient in Linux and Docker basics

Cloud Integration Basic understanding of Azure/AWS services

DevOps Can use CI/CD pipelines and scripts

QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE REQUIRED

· Experience: 5 – 8 years of experience.

· Education: BE / MCA, or any other equivalent degree in Computer Science.