VP, Technical Operations

The Vice President, Global Technical Operations will partner with Executive Leadership and Regional Management to drive a customer and employee-focused culture of safety, operational excellence, and teamwork across Digital Realty’s global footprint. 

The role will be responsible for developing and executing strategy, standards, and processes to align technical and engineering operations across Digital Realty’s global data center portfolio. The position will manage a team of senior-level engineering and operational specialists who will drive operational strategies, process improvement, systems strategy and performance analytics across infrastructure operation, maintenance and change, incident management, and remote hands.  In addition, this role will drive global reliability and partner with regional leadership to support design & operational improvements, infrastructure failures and root cause analysis.

What you’ll do 

• Establish and maintain global standards for engineering operations across infrastructure operation, maintenance, change management, incident management, commissioning/acceptance, reliability, and staffing. 

• Partner with regional leadership across Americas, APAC and EMEA to identify operational best practices and drive global alignment through procedural development, training, and quality assurance programs.

• Support regional leadership, as needed, following infrastructure failures or customer impacting outages to drive thorough root cause analysis and remediation.  Challenge OEM and maintenance partner conclusions and root cause analyses when appropriate.

• Drive global reliability analysis to identify failure trends across OEM, infrastructure design, operational procedures, or training. Analyze cross-regional failure trends to identify systemic problems and track remediation across the global footprint.

• Develop and manage robust lessons learned and knowledge management processes as well as means of storage and dissemination across regions.

• Provide technical support for acquisitions via site level due diligence, risk assessment and underwriting support.

• Partner with the Design, Construction & Engineering and Advanced Engineering teams to validate new infrastructure designs, new technology, infrastructure sequence of operations, commissioning standards and reliability analysis.

• Provide operational standards for remote hands, connectivity installation and other connectivity services in partnership with Product Management and Colocation Engineering.

• Partner with Operations Systems team, IT, regional leadership, and other various operational stakeholders, to drive operational system improvements and investments across BMS, CMMS, DCIM, alarm management and other operational tools.

• Partner with procurement to drive global consistency across maintenance scopes of work, vendor qualification processes and service levels.  Support supply chain risk assessments and alternative supply chain solutions.

• Provide and maintain guidelines regarding “end of life” infrastructure replacement, risk assessment and condition-based maintenance standards.

• Oversee operational performance reporting and KPI program – globally, regionally, and cross-operational department – including availability, human error trends, OEM infrastructure performance, safety, and other industry common performance indicators.

• Partner with energy management department, sustainability, and regional leadership to drive operational efficiency standards across PUE, WUE and other energy or sustainability related programs as required.

• Support customer business reviews, lease/sales negotiations, SLA risks assessment and customer inquiries as necessary to support key strategic accounts.

• Support our compliance teams during audits of our operational processes, root cause analysis methods and validation of completion of remediation and mitigating actions.

• Provide technical engineering support or analysis as required by other departments (i.e. Executive Management, Finance, Investor Relations, Risk Management, etc.) as required.

• Maintain engagement with recognized industry associations, thought leaders and regulatory bodies to ensure operational standards and reporting requirements are aligned with industry trends.

What you’ll need

• 10+ years or significant experience overseeing technical engineering operations across a global or multi-national program. Data center infrastructure or mission critical operations management experience required.

• Undergraduate degree in engineering or professional engineering license required.

• Demonstrated track record of driving strategic initiatives and continuous improvement across large- scaled operation.

• Strong leader of people; developer of talent and ability to manage cross-functional teams in a direct-line or matrix reporting structure.

• Cultural fit is crucial. Commitment to excellence and teamwork paramount.

• Exceptional interpersonal, team building, collaboration, and facilitation skills required. Ability to effectively communicate and interact across diverse audiences. 

• Expert knowledge of mission critical operations & design including applicable industry standards and regulatory codes. 

• Ability to travel globally as required (>25% travel per month)

A bit about us

Digital Realty brings companies and data together by delivering the full spectrum of data center, colocation and interconnection solutions. PlatformDIGITAL®, the company’s global data center platform, provides customers with a secure data meeting place and a proven Pervasive Datacenter Architecture (PDx®) solution methodology for powering innovation and efficiently managing Data Gravity challenges. Digital Realty gives its customers access to the connected data communities that matter to them with a global data center footprint of 300+ facilities in 50+ metros across 25+ countries on six continents.

A bit about our Digital team

Our Operations team keeps our customers’ infrastructure running safely and securely. We get plenty of opportunities to take on a variety of tasks and develop our technical skills. From overseeing electrical power to cooling and fire suppression systems, our team plays a vital role in making sure everything in our data centers operates as it should.

What we can offer you

Our rapidly evolving business sector offers the opportunity to be part of a courageous and passionate team who work together to understand and meet the changing needs of our global customers. 

Join us and you’ll be part of a supportive and inclusive environment where you can bring your whole self to work. As part of our team, you’ll get to work with people from different business areas, challenge the way we do things and put your ideas into action. We’ll also give you plenty of development opportunities so you can build a rewarding and successful career with us. 

Our Compensation Philosophy

Digital Realty offers its employees a highly competitive compensation package, excellent benefits, and an environment that recognizes and rewards your contributions. Central to our compensation philosophy is rewarding our employees for achieving the values and objectives aligned to the company's overall goals and values.

This is an exciting time to join our business so apply now and make your mark on our future.

Notes:

The above statements are intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by people assigned to this job. They are not intended to be an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties, and skills required of personnel so classified.

Digital Realty is an equal opportunity employer, EOE/AA/M/F/Vets/Disabled.  All applicants will receive consideration for employment and will not be discriminated against on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, national origin, disability or protected veteran status, or other status protected by law or Company policy.

Digital Realty is a publicly traded company (NYSE: DLR) with investment grade ratings from all three major ratings agencies.