Data Center Manager

Naperville, IL$114,500 - $194,70010+ years

About Northern Trust

As a global leader in innovative wealth management, asset servicing, asset management and banking services, Northern Trust (Nasdaq: NTRS) is proud to guide the world’s most successful individuals, families, corporations and institutions.

Since 1889, we have aligned our efforts with our three guiding Principles That Endure: Service, Expertise, and Integrity. Together, they reflect the three cornerstones of business conduct which we strive to instill in our employees, whom we call partners, and to provide to our clients and the communities we serve worldwide.

With more than 135 years of financial experience and over 24,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

Role Summary

Northern Trust is seeking a Data Center Site Operations Manager to lead U.S. Data Center Management operations supporting mission-critical infrastructure across the firm’s enterprise data center environment. This role is responsible for operational reliability, day-to-day execution, infrastructure lifecycle support, staffing coordination, change governance, audit readiness, vendor oversight, and continuous improvement across assigned data center locations.

The successful candidate will lead a highly controlled, process-driven operating environment where execution quality, operational stability, documentation discipline, and risk management are essential. This position requires a strong combination of technical data center knowledge, operational leadership, financial discipline, vendor management, and the ability to coordinate effectively across infrastructure, facilities, security, governance, and business partner teams.

This is an evolving leadership role. The candidate must be prepared to support Northern Trust’s current data center operations while helping adapt operating practices, staffing models, documentation, and support processes as the firm’s data center footprint, hosting model, and infrastructure locations continue to change. The role may include support for traditional enterprise data centers, remote or distributed environments, and colocation-based operating models as business needs evolve.

Primary Responsibilities

Data Center Operations and Lifecycle Management

Lead day-to-day operational readiness across assigned enterprise data center locations, ensuring stable execution of physical infrastructure support activities.
Oversee physical adds, moves, changes, decommissions, rack deployments, cabling, power coordination, hardware lifecycle work, and related data center support activities.
Support complex infrastructure lifecycle and migration programs involving enterprise compute, storage, network, private cloud, hyperconverged infrastructure, and mainframe-class environments.
Maintain physical inventory accuracy and operational data integrity using DCIM, asset management, and inventory-control platforms.
Reinforce disciplined physical operating standards across the data center environment, including cable management, labeling, technical organization, safety, and execution quality.
Support operational readiness for future data center locations, remote environments, distributed infrastructure, or colocation facilities as the technology footprint evolves.

Team Leadership and Resource Management

Lead and develop the Data Center Management team, including site-based technical staff, project-support resources, contractors, vendors, and skilled labor support.
Provide mentorship, coaching, and development opportunities that strengthen technical depth, ownership, execution discipline, and leadership readiness across the team.
Manage staffing capacity, contractor/vendor engagement, skilled-trade coordination, supplier support, and continuity planning required to maintain stable operations.
Govern third-party activity to ensure vendor and contractor work aligns with site protocols, operating controls, safety expectations, documentation standards, and execution requirements.
Serve as an escalation point for on-site operational issues requiring leadership judgment, prioritization, risk evaluation, or cross-team coordination.
Help establish scalable operating models that can support current and future data center locations and infrastructure hosting arrangements.

Change Governance, Intake, and Execution Oversight

Own and continuously improve the data center workload intake model using IT service management and change-management tools.
Ensure requests, changes, execution plans, and implementation activities meet readiness, documentation, risk, and control expectations before work proceeds.
Review, govern, and support Methods of Procedure, work instructions, implementation plans, and change documentation for sensitive physical activities, including live-power events, migrations, cutovers, and weekend execution windows.
Coordinate with partner teams and change governance forums to ensure proposed work is clearly documented, operationally sound, properly risk-evaluated, and ready for execution.
Translate complex technical work into clear operational plans, escalation points, and leadership updates.

Audit, Compliance, and Documentation Ownership

Maintain an audit-ready operating environment across data center processes, controls, workflows, and formal documentation.
Oversee asset management coordination, inventory integrity, workflow documentation, standards adherence, control validation, and audit/compliance follow-up.
Ensure formal Data Center Management documentation remains current, controlled, accurate, and aligned with operating practices.
Support audit reviews, evidence requests, process walkthroughs, documentation refreshes, and control validation activities tied to data center operations.
Promote a culture of documentation discipline, operational ownership, and process consistency across the team.

Financial, Vendor, and Administrative Oversight

Support financial and administrative activities required to sustain data center operations, including purchasing coordination, invoice review, budget input, vendor engagement, and resource planning.
Partner with internal stakeholders, procurement, suppliers, and vendors to align labor, materials, and service delivery with operational demand and project schedules.
Support vendor statements of work, purchase order activity, spend reporting, and material/labor planning as required.
Ensure vendor-supported work is aligned with site protocols, business priorities, operational risk, and delivery expectations.

Strategic and Organizational Responsibilities

Provide practical operational leadership and strategic input for data center lifecycle planning, migration readiness, infrastructure modernization, and process standardization.
Support the evolution of operating practices as Northern Trust’s data center footprint, technology platforms, and hosting locations change over time.
Prepare clear operational updates, metrics, KPIs, risk communications, and executive-ready summaries for leadership and partner organizations.
Strengthen continuity readiness by developing team capability, improving documentation, reinforcing process ownership, and ensuring critical work can continue through staffing or priority changes.
Act as a trusted operational partner to infrastructure, facilities, security, audit, procurement, and technology leadership teams.

Required Qualifications

10 or more years of progressive experience in enterprise data center engineering, infrastructure deployment, site operations, or mission-critical technology operations.
Demonstrated experience supporting or leading infrastructure operations in a regulated, high-control, or mission-critical environment.
Proven ability to lead complex physical infrastructure work, including lifecycle activity, hardware deployments, migrations, decommissions, cabling, power coordination, and live production support.
Experience managing work across internal technical teams, contractors, vendors, suppliers, facilities teams, and partner technology organizations.
Strong understanding of enterprise data center infrastructure, including compute, storage, network, private cloud, hyperconverged platforms, high-availability systems, and mainframe-class environments.
Familiarity with structured cabling standards and physical-layer connectivity, including single-mode fiber, copper cabling, high-density optical connectivity, and related labeling/documentation practices.
Working knowledge of data center power, cooling, UPS, generator-backed infrastructure, and environmental considerations.
Experience with IT service management, change management, DCIM, asset management, inventory-control, or workflow-management platforms.
Strong communication skills with the ability to explain operational readiness, risks, dependencies, and execution plans to technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Preferred Qualifications

Experience in financial services, regulated technology environments, or other industries where infrastructure availability and control discipline are critical.
Experience leading teams responsible for multiple data center locations, remote infrastructure environments, or colocation support models.
Experience developing or improving operational processes, intake models, change governance practices, documentation standards, and audit-ready workflows.
Experience supporting major infrastructure lifecycle programs, data center migrations, modernization initiatives, or high-density technology deployments.
Familiarity with vendor management, supplier coordination, contract support, purchasing processes, and material/labor planning.
Demonstrated ability to build team capability, mentor technical staff, and create sustainable operating models.

Leadership Competencies

Process-driven leadership style with strong attention to operational control, execution quality, and risk management.
Ability to balance daily operational demands, major project activity, staffing constraints, vendor coordination, and compliance expectations.
Strong judgment in high-pressure operational situations, including incident response, escalation management, and critical change windows.
Ability to communicate clearly across technology, facilities, security, audit, procurement, vendor, and executive stakeholder groups.
Commitment to documentation discipline, ownership, accountability, continuous improvement, and operational resilience.
Ability to lead through change as infrastructure footprints, hosting models, and support expectations evolve.

Work Environment and Operating Expectations

This role requires regular on-site presence across assigned data center locations.
The role will require support during after-hours maintenance windows, weekend change activity, incident response, and critical infrastructure events.
The candidate must be comfortable operating in live production environments where planning, communication, control discipline, and execution quality are essential.
The role requires coordination across physical data center operations, infrastructure technology teams, facilities, security, vendors, contractors, governance groups, and leadership stakeholders.
As Northern Trust’s data center environment evolves, this role may support additional operating models, locations, remote environments, or colocation-based infrastructure support needs.