Lead Director - Network and Data Center Engineering
About The Position
The Lead Director, AI Network & Data Center Engineering is responsible for leading the strategy, design, and delivery of the organization’s network infrastructure supporting enterprise applications and next-generation AI/ML workloads. This role oversees the development of high‑performance, low‑latency data center and cloud networking capabilities that enable large-scale GPU environments, advanced data processing, and modern application platforms. By establishing architectural standards, driving consistent execution, and ensuring secure, resilient connectivity, this position plays a critical role in supporting the organization’s most demanding technology initiatives. This leader is accountable for building and guiding a high-performing team of network and data center engineers, while aligning infrastructure capabilities to evolving business and security needs. Working closely with cloud, platform, and cybersecurity leadership, the role drives adoption of modern architectures, automation, and performance optimization practices to improve reliability, scalability, and efficiency. Through strong strategic direction and operational leadership, the Lead Director ensures the network function can support long-term growth, increasing AI demand, and enterprise-wide digital transformation.
Requirements
- 10+ years’ experience in network and/or data center engineering
- 5+ years’ experience in a strategic leadership position with people management
- 5+ years’ experience in large scale enterprise environments
- Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience (High School Diploma and 4 years relevant experience)
Nice To Haves
- Strong expertise in large-scale data center design, security, and high availability
- Advanced problem-solving, execution, and stakeholder management skills
- Experience with AI factory / GPU cluster environments at scale
- Enterprise networking, Cisco Nexus/ACI or similar platforms
- Network automation / IaC, SDN, service mesh, and cloud-native security frameworks
- High availability/disaster recovery design and cyber resilience
- Certifications: CCIE/CCNP, PCNSE, CISSP, Cloud networking
Responsibilities
- Define and enforce network architecture standards, security controls, and compliance policies
- Establish best practices for configuration, deployment, and operations
- Ensure alignment with enterprise governance frameworks (HIPAA, NIST, PCI, HITRUST, CSA)
- Advise executives on network strategy, roadmaps, emerging technologies, and industry trends
- Partner with cross-functional teams (platform, cloud, security, infrastructure) to deliver integrated, secure and scalable solutions
- Engage vendors on solution architectures, design, contracts, and delivery
- Design and implement: Data center fabrics (leaf-spine, Clos, EVPN/VXLAN)
- Design and implement: AI/GPU-optimized networking (low latency, high throughput) and related technologies
- Design and implement: Optimize performance for GPU workloads (RDMA, RoCE, ECN, PFC)
- Design and implement: GCP and multi-cloud network architectures
- Design and implement: Routing & switching (BGP, OSPF, MPLS, STP; Cisco, Juniper, Arista)
- Design and implement: High-speed networking (100/200/400Gb+)
- Design and implement: GPU cluster networking, traffic optimization, and congestion management
- Drive network monitoring and performance optimization (SolarWinds, NetFlow, Wireshark)
- Support SaaS and multi-tenant environments with zero trust patterns
- Oversee 24/7 network operations across cloud and data centers
- Lead incident response and ensure high availability, resiliency and scalability across network and cloud environments
- Build and mentor high-performing engineering teams
- Foster a culture of collaboration, accountability, and continuous learning
- Advance networking capabilities for: AI/ML infrastructure and GPU clusters (NVIDIA architectures)
- Advance networking capabilities for: High-performance networking (RoCE, PFC, ECN)
- Champion automation and Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
- Contribute to industry and open-source initiatives
- Own network architecture strategy and roadmap
- Define standards for AI, cloud, and data center environments
- Support budgeting, risk management, and long-term planning
Benefits
- medical
- dental
- vision coverage
- paid time off
- retirement savings options
- wellness programs
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Director
Education Level
Associate degree
