Director, IT Infrastructure

PHOTRONICS INC•Brookfield, CT

About The Position

The Global IT Operations Director is accountable for the stability, resilience, and continuous improvement of enterprise IT operations across a global footprint, including network, data center, and telecom services. This role requires a technically credible leader who can manage a diverse operations team while remaining hands-on during critical incidents and escalations. The ideal candidate brings deep experience in Microsoft enterprise platforms, ITIL-aligned service management, disaster recovery, and operational process maturity within a mid-size enterprise environment.

Requirements

Strong knowledge of enterprise IT operations within mid-size to large global organizations.
Strong technical knowledge of enterprise infrastructure technologies including WAN/LAN, Wi-Fi, internet circuits, firewalls, data center/colocation operations, telecom/voice systems, compute, virtualization, storage, backup, and endpoint management environments.
Proficiency with Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365, Intune, and related Microsoft enterprise technologies.
Knowledge of disaster recovery (DR), business continuity planning (BCP), recovery objectives (RTO/RPO), and operational resiliency practices.
Knowledge of ITSM frameworks and ITIL-aligned operational processes, including incident management, change control, and service delivery best practices.
Working knowledge of identity and access management concepts within Microsoft ecosystems, including Entra ID/Azure AD and operational security practices.
Experience with monitoring, observability, and operational analytics tools, including alerting, dashboards, and trend analysis.
Strong analytical and reporting skills with proficiency in Excel and experience using Power BI or Tableau.
Strong process mapping, documentation, standardization, and continuous improvement capabilities, including development of operational runbooks and knowledge practices.
Strong leadership, vendor management, and cross-functional collaboration skills within global or multi-region environments.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to translate technical operations into business impact for technical and non-technical stakeholders.
Ability to balance strategic oversight with hands-on operational problem solving in fast-paced, production-critical environments.
Ability to manage multiple priorities, drive operational discipline and automation, and maintain service quality within budget constraints.
Strong project and program execution capabilities supporting infrastructure modernization, operational transitions, and continuous improvement initiatives.
8+ years of IT operations experience within mid-size to enterprise environments.
Proven leadership experience managing global or multi-region IT operations teams.
Hands-on experience supporting enterprise infrastructure, networking, telecom, virtualization, storage, backup, and Microsoft enterprise environments.
Experience owning disaster recovery and business continuity planning initiatives.
Experience building, implementing, or maturing ITSM platforms and ITIL-aligned operational processes.
Experience managing vendors, managed service providers, and operational budgets.

Nice To Haves

Experience supporting always-on, manufacturing, or production-critical environments preferred.
Experience supporting security operations and identity management initiatives preferred.
Experience leading infrastructure modernization projects, site deployments, and vendor transition initiatives preferred.
ITIL certification preferred.
Relevant industry certifications such as CCNA, CCNP, Microsoft Azure certifications, or telecom/voice platform certifications are a plus.

Responsibilities

Lead and develop a globally distributed, technically diverse IT operations team.
Ensure reliable, secure, and scalable IT operations across infrastructure and end-user platforms.
Design, implement, and mature ITIL-aligned ITSM processes (Incident, Problem, Change, Request, Knowledge).
Establish and operate an effective Major Incident Management (MIM) and on-call/escalation model across regions/time zones.
Own Disaster Recovery (DR) and Business Continuity Planning (BCP), including documentation, testing, and continuous improvement.
Provide operational leadership for Microsoft platforms: Azure, Microsoft 365, and Intune.
Own and oversee core infrastructure operations: network (WAN/LAN/Wi Fi, internet circuits, firewalls), data centers/colocation (facilities coordination, racks/stack, power/cooling), telecom/voice, servers/compute, virtualization, storage, backup, and recovery.
Drive monitoring/observability maturity (alert quality, event correlation, runbooks) and reduce noise while improving detection time.
Own operational governance for patching, vulnerability remediation, endpoint/server hardening, and configuration standards (in partnership with Security).
Champion configuration management and accurate asset/service inventories (CMDB), including dependencies required for DR and incident response.
Own carrier and telecom/network vendor management, including circuit sourcing and renewals, SLA/OLA enforcement, cost optimization, and escalation through outages.
Oversee vendor/managed service performance, including contract deliverables, service quality reviews, and escalation management.
Establish and track operational KPIs, SLAs, and service health metrics; drive action based on trends and recurring issues.
Map end-to-end operational processes and drive measurable, continuous improvement initiatives through standardization and automation.
Communicate clearly with executive stakeholders on risk, stability, and operational performance.
Build Power BI/Tableau dashboards for executive reporting on IT infrastructure health.