Observability Platform Engineer (Datadog)

Neuberger Berman•New York, NY

1d•$130,000 - $180,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Neuberger's Technology team is seeking a Vice President to define and lead our enterprise observability strategy across cloud and on-premises environments. You will own the Datadog platform, the operating model around it, and the team that runs it. Your goal is to give the firm continuous (24/7) visibility into the health of business-critical systems, including external websites, network and security infrastructure, and container platforms such as OpenShift. You will set the direction for logs, metrics, traces, Service Level Objectives (SLOs), synthetic monitoring and Real User Monitoring (RUM). You will also lead the firm's migration from OpenView to Datadog, and be accountable for improving reliability, speeding up incident response, and optimizing cost. You will work as a trusted partner to senior leaders in Application Engineering, SRE/DevOps, Infrastructure, Security and Service Management.

Requirements

9+ years of experience in observability engineering or infrastructure monitoring
Proven record of owning an enterprise observability or monitoring platform and delivering a large-scale migration.
Deep knowledge of Datadog (APM, Infrastructure, Logs, Synthetics, RUM, SLOs, Monitors, Dashboards, NPM) and of distributed tracing, metrics pipelines and logging standards.
Strong command of Windows Server and Unix (Linux/Solaris) environments, and of cloud integrations (Azure and AWS).
Hands-on credibility in automation and infrastructure as code (Python, PowerShell, Bash, Terraform, Datadog API/SDK), with the ability to guide technical design.
Experience with ITSM integration (such as ServiceNow) and with incident, problem and change processes.
Demonstrated ability to reduce alert noise and MTTR and to establish SLO practices.
Experience managing platform licensing and cost optimization, overseeing vendor relationships, and working with cross-functional stakeholders.
Strong executive presence and written and verbal communication skills.
Applicants must be authorized and have the right to work in the country where the role is located without the need for current or future sponsorship.

Nice To Haves

Datadog certifications, and a bachelor's degree in a technical field or equivalent experience.
Experience with OpenTelemetry, OpenShift/Kubernetes and OpenView (or comparable legacy tools).
Experience in financial services or another regulated environment.
Experience leading technical teams.

Responsibilities

Define and own the multi-year observability vision, roadmap and target-state architecture, with Datadog as the central platform.
Establish the operating model: service ownership, tagging and metadata standards, onboarding criteria, support tiers and engagement with application teams.
Present platform health, reliability metrics and program progress to senior management and technology governance forums.
Own end-to-end delivery of the OpenView-to-Datadog migration, including scope, milestones, risks, dependencies, cutover and decommissioning. Make sure coverage is preserved and monitoring fidelity improves.
Prioritize and sequence onboarding of applications and infrastructure across Windows Server, Unix (Linux/Solaris), Azure, AWS and OpenShift.
Set the SLO and error budget framework, and drive its adoption by engineering teams.
Own targets for reducing alert noise and MTTR, using monitor correlation, enrichment, dependency mapping and threshold governance.
Sponsor end-user experience monitoring (RUM and Synthetics) for external-facing services and critical workflows.
Oversee integration with ServiceNow for incident and problem routing and escalation, and make sure runbooks and post-incident reviews feed continuous improvement.
Set enterprise standards for instrumentation, logging, metrics and tracing. Lead OpenTelemetry adoption.
Require observability-as-code (Datadog API, Terraform, Python, PowerShell, Bash) to ensure consistent, auditable configuration at scale.
Work with Information Security on data handling, access control, and telemetry that supports security and compliance.
Make sure all observability designs account for corporate network and proxy constraints.
Manage Datadog licensing and consumption, including usage monitoring and forecasting.
Drive cost optimization across logs, custom metrics and synthetic transactions through volume controls, governance and usage reporting.
Oversee the vendor relationship, including roadmap alignment, support escalations and tool rationalization.
Deliver executive and operational dashboards and reliability reporting.
Act as the internal advocate for observability best practices across the technology organization.