Critical Facilities Operations Manager
A leading global financial institution is seeking an experienced Head of Data Centre & Critical Facilities Operations to lead the strategic management and operational performance of its EMEA data centre estate. This is a senior leadership role responsible for ensuring the resilience, availability, and compliance of mission-critical infrastructure environments supporting the bank's core technology platforms. The successful candidate will provide strategic oversight of data centre operations, facilities management, infrastructure resilience, and vendor governance across multiple sites. Operating within a highly regulated environment, the role will ensure that the bank's data centre facilities and supporting infrastructure meet the highest standards of operational excellence, regulatory compliance, and service availability. The Critical Facilities Operations Manager will be responsible for the leadership, governance, and operational management of all EMEA data centre environments and associated equipment rooms. Working closely with technology leadership, facilities management providers, and infrastructure teams, the role will ensure that critical infrastructure including power, cooling, environmental monitoring, telecommunications connectivity, and structured cabling operate reliably and efficiently.
The role will also drive long-term capacity planning, resilience strategy and operational best practices across the organisation's data centre estate.
Duties:
- Provide strategic leadership for the bank's EMEA data centre and critical facilities operations.
- Ensure the resilience, availability, and operational integrity of mission-critical infrastructure environments.
- Oversee the management of power, cooling, environmental monitoring, and other critical facilities systems across the data centre estate.
- Lead operational governance across data centre activities, including equipment installation, moves/adds/changes, remote hands, and infrastructure decommissioning.
- Develop and implement long-term capacity planning strategies covering power, cooling and space utilisation.
- Manage relationships with facilities management providers and specialist infrastructure vendors.
- Ensure operational procedures and governance controls are maintained across all data centre environments.
- Lead disaster recovery planning and testing across critical infrastructure environments.
- Ensure infrastructure environments meet regulatory and audit requirements, including Sarbanes-Oxley Act and SOC 1.
- Maintain accurate asset and infrastructure inventory across the data centre estate.
- Oversee the design, installation, and commissioning of infrastructure, including equipment rooms and structured cabling environments.
- Coordinate the delivery and resilience of telecommunications circuits supporting critical infrastructure.
Experience required:
- Significant experience leading enterprise data centre and critical facilities operations.
- Experience operating within financial services or other highly regulated industries.