Datacenter Program Manager - Network

Microsoft • Chicago, IL

1d • $102,600 - $225,800

About The Position

Microsoft is hiring a Datacenter Business Operations Program Manager focused on reducing stranded capacity through deployment planning and optimization of IT capacity. The role works closely with Electrical Engineers and Critical Environment Field Service Engineers and supports Microsoft Cloud Operations & Innovation (CO+I), which delivers infrastructure for services including Bing, Office 365, Xbox, OneDrive, and Microsoft Azure.

The position enables datacenter capacity through increased Infrastructure Utilization Effectiveness and Power Harvesting, and leads retrofit efforts to upgrade legacy datacenters and harvest capacity across the existing fleet. The work supports a global infrastructure of more than 100 datacenters and 1 million servers, with environmental sustainability and optimization among the stated priorities.

The program manager owns projects from intake through close-out across IT, network, infrastructure, remediation, and modernization work. They coordinate stakeholders and delivery teams, manage plans, schedules, risks, costs, and service incidents, and execute work in live production datacenters while complying with safety, security, access-control, and change-management standards. The role requires passing Microsoft Cloud background screening and verification of U.S. citizenship for federal government security requirements.

Requirements

• High school qualification or equivalent and at least 3 years of experience supporting IT equipment or related technology, or delivering server and network deployment projects in large-scale environments, or equivalent experience.
• Ability to meet Microsoft, customer, and/or government security screening requirements, including passing the Microsoft Cloud Background Check upon hire or transfer and every two years thereafter.
• Verification of U.S. citizenship to meet federal government security requirements.

Nice To Haves

• Bachelor's or technical college degree in Computer Science, Math, Telecommunications, Electrical/Mechanical Engineering, Supply Chain Management, or a related field and at least 8 years of experience working in physical IT infrastructures; alternatively, high school qualification or equivalent and at least 10 years of such experience, or equivalent experience.
• Experience working with physical IT infrastructure such as servers, SANs, networking, capacity, data center racks/enclosures, and structured cabling.
• Applicable certifications such as APICS/Inventory Control, CompTIA, Microsoft, network certifications, CCNA, ITIL v3 Foundation, or Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) certifications.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end execution of datacenter initiatives from intake through close-out, ensuring service quality, completeness, and customer experience across IT, network, infrastructure, remediation, and modernization projects.
• Build and manage project plans, schedules, milestones, and dependencies across parallel workstreams; review schedules proactively and offer alternatives when defining customer solutions.
• Execute projects in live production datacenters in compliance with safety, security, change-management, MOP/SOP, and access-control requirements, and immediately report safety or security concerns.
• Assess and communicate potential customer impacts from operational events such as lock-downs and maintenance windows, planning to minimize disruption.
• Serve as the coordination point among Datacenter Operations, Engineering, Construction, IT/Network teams, vendors, integrators, and contractors; clarify, document, and meet expectations.
• Manage stakeholder expectations, resolve conflicts, maintain alignment, and coordinate solutions while communicating alternatives as needed.
• Identify schedule, technical, safety, and operational risks; suggest ways to reduce maintenance risk and develop mitigation and contingency plans with relevant teams.
• Troubleshoot service incidents and escalate appropriately to meet SLAs and OLAs with minimal disruption.
• Track project costs and resource utilization and help keep work within approved budgets and timelines.
• Balance execution speed with operational stability and quality in alignment with management priorities and company culture and values.
• Embody Microsoft's culture and values.

Benefits

• Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation; additional benefits and pay information is available through the linked Microsoft careers page.
• Training and growth opportunities, including Career Rotation Programs, Diversity & Inclusion trainings and events, and professional certifications.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Education Level: High school or GED