AVD Consultant - Contractual

Overview

Own the technical migration of Kaufman Rossin's virtual desktop environment from Citrix DaaS on Nutanix to Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) managed through Nerdio, supporting approximately 760 users across the US and India. The core infrastructure is already built; this contractual role validates the architecture, closes gaps, leads production cutover, and transfers knowledge to the internal IT team.

What you'll do

• Review the existing AVD design across networking, private DNS, storage, and Conditional Access, validate it against Microsoft and Nerdio best practices, and document prioritized remediation.
• Close identified gaps in identity, network segmentation, and data protection.
• Own the golden image build, versioning, and patching process.
• Define the app delivery approach (MSIX app attach, baked into the image, or packaged) on an app-by-app basis, and provide a path for legacy applications that do not fit AVD.
• Right-size host pools based on real utilization and user profiles.
• Tune Nerdio auto-scale settings for performance and cost.
• Optimize US–India latency and end-user experience, including connection quality and profile/storage performance.
• Evaluate and recommend Reserved Instances or Azure Savings Plans.
• Build scaling schedules aligned to US and India working hours.
• Recommend storage tiering and ongoing cost governance practices.
• Plan and run pilot groups with feedback loops before each wave.
• Partner with IT and business leaders on user communication and support readiness.
• Define and test a rollback plan.
• Recommend how long to run Citrix and AVD in parallel, and lead production cutover and Citrix decommissioning.
• Set up alerting and dashboards in Nerdio and Azure Monitor.
• Write and maintain operational runbooks for day-to-day support, incident response, and scaling events.
• Define health checks and escalation paths for the AVD environment.
• Deliver documented handoff for every component built or changed.
• Run working sessions with KR IT staff so the team can operate the environment independently.
• Identify automation and process improvement opportunities.

What you'll need

• 5+ years of experience in end-user computing, virtual desktop, or cloud infrastructure.
• At least 2 years of hands-on Azure Virtual Desktop in production.
• Experience migrating from Citrix (DaaS or on-premises) or a comparable VDI platform, ideally for 500+ users.
• Hands-on experience with Nerdio Manager for Enterprise, including auto-scale, image management, and host pool administration.
• Strong Azure networking and security skills, including virtual networks, private endpoints, private DNS, and Entra ID Conditional Access.
• Experience with image management and app delivery, including MSIX app attach, FSLogix, and golden image patching.
• Familiarity with Azure cost management, including Reservations, Savings Plans, and scaling schedules.
• Experience with Azure Monitor and alerting for AVD environments.
• Ability to design and execute pilot, cutover, and rollback plans for large user populations.
• Experience supporting globally distributed users, ideally across US and India.
• Excellent written and spoken English for stakeholder communication, technical documentation, and training.

Nice to have

• Microsoft AZ-140 (Azure Virtual Desktop Specialty) certification.
• Citrix or Nutanix experience.

Details

• Contractual role.
• Hybrid work policy.
• Working directly with peers in the US.