Microsoft Gulf
Data Center Operations Director
- Permanent
- Dammam, Saudi Arabia
- Experience 5 - 10 yrs
Job overview
Date posted
19/10/2025
Location
Dammam, Saudi Arabia
Salary
SAR 50,000 - 60,000 per month
Compensation
Job description
The Data Center Operations Director (People Manager) in Dammam, Saudi Arabia leads Microsoft Cloud Operations & Innovation (CO+I) datacenter operations, delivering core infrastructure and foundational technologies that power services such as Bing, Office 365, Xbox, OneDrive, and Microsoft Azure. Operating within a global portfolio of more than 100 datacenters and 1 million servers serving over 1 billion customers and 20 million businesses in 90+ countries, the role emphasizes environmental sustainability, optimization, and continuous evolution to meet changing business demands. The position requires mission-critical service management experience and leadership of a diverse technical team, with responsibility for end-to-end service compliance, quality, client satisfaction, and adherence to SLAs/OLAs. The director documents and aligns dependencies, supplier contracts, success metrics, and readiness criteria; reviews SLAs, KPIs, and OKRs to drive efficiency across IT and Critical Environment (CE) services; and partners cross-functionally on global and regional initiatives including environmental health and safety, risk assessments, and certifications. The role manages/supports budget alignment (including planning and demand cost forecasting), communicates implications of service management issues, and plans work with business partners to maintain datacenter availability, safety, and security in accordance with EHS run books. Responsibilities include service delivery leadership, incident participation for Sev 1/Sev 2 bridges with approval of root cause analysis and postmortem reporting, sharing best practices to mitigate recurrence of issues, enabling pilot programs and task forces, ensuring appropriate staffing and required training, and empowering teams through visibility and collaboration with regional/global management. The director removes barriers to agility, maintains a broad perspective to incorporate diverse viewpoints, establishes a culture of safety, quality, and customer obsession, enables cross-organization strategies, delegates effectively to build future leaders, and recognizes team successes. Ownership includes accountability for service quality, completeness, and customer experience; resolving or escalating unaddressed issues; communicating risks, dependencies, and budget implications to business leaders; and modeling accountability and morale. Background check compliance (Microsoft Cloud Background Check upon hire/transfer and biennially) is required. Benefits may include industry-leading healthcare, educational resources, discounts, savings and investments, parental leave, generous time away, giving programs, and networking opportunities.
Required skills
Key responsibilities
- Lead and develop a diverse technical workforce by modeling, coaching, and caring; define team objectives and enable success across boundaries.
- Document and drive alignment on dependencies, supplier contracts, success metrics, resource readiness, operational supportability, and manageability criteria.
- Review SLAs, KPIs, and OKRs, providing input to improve efficiency across IT and Critical Environment services.
- Partner cross-functionally on global and regional initiatives (EHS, risk assessments, certifications) to uphold safety and compliance.
- Manage and support data center budget alignment, plan and forecast demand costs, and communicate service management implications to business leaders.
- Plan and coordinate with business partners to maintain datacenter availability, safety, and security; adhere to EHS run books and report safety/security issues.
- Own end-to-end service compliance, quality, and client satisfaction for agreed service levels with a strong customer focus.
- Manage client relationships, clarify expectations, and deliver solutions that exceed expectations while minimizing disruption.
- Apply deep subject matter expertise to meet SLA/OLA commitments; review and communicate performance metrics to teams.
- Share recurring issues with regional/global teams and implement best practices to prevent recurrence and improve resolution efficiency.
- Allocate resources for pilot programs and task forces; recommend additional funding when necessary.
- Forecast future business demand to ensure appropriate staffing levels and ensure teams complete required training in partnership with L&D.
- Participate in all Sev 1 and Sev 2 incident bridges and approve root cause analysis and postmortem reporting.
- Enable cross-team collaboration and create visibility to help regional/global teams succeed.
- Remove barriers to agility, enable rapid priority shifts without productivity loss, and incorporate diverse viewpoints in strategy.
- Establish and maintain a culture of safety, quality, and customer obsession aligned to overall service objectives.
- Facilitate division-wide collaboration, set cross-team commitments, and scale outcomes by enabling the work of others.
Experience & skills
- High School Diploma or equivalent and 5+ yearsâ experience in mission-critical service management (e.g., IT services, manufacturing, warehouse, retail, military, or managing physical operations in IT/critical environment infrastructure).
- 3+ yearsâ experience leading a diverse technical team.
- Ability to meet Microsoft, customer, and/or government security screening requirements, including passing the Microsoft Cloud Background Check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.
- Preferred: 6+ years enterprise-level experience managing large-scale, complex projects/programs; 6+ years in Critical Environment infrastructures (UPS, Generator, AHU); 6+ years in physical IT infrastructures (Servers, SANs, Networking, Capacity, DC racks/enclosures, structured cabling); experience managing budgets of $1M+.
- Preferred: Bachelorâs Degree in Computer Science, Math, Telecommunications, Electrical/Mechanical Engineering, Supply Chain Management, or related field.
- Preferred: 5+ yearsâ experience leading diverse technical workforces or managing global/virtual teams.
- Preferred certifications: ASICS/Inventory Control, CompTIA, Microsoft, Network/CCNA, ITIL v3 Foundation, Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF), Leadership Development, PMP, CDCP.
- Willingness to work fully on-site with travel 0â25% and operate within a professional, full-time schedule with incident participation as required.