Director, Operational Technology (OT) Engineering

About the role

NorthMark Compute & Cloud (NMC²) operates at the bleeding edge of high‑performance computing (HPC) and cloud infrastructure, enabling breakthroughs for research, production, and delivery. The company’s engineers build critical infrastructure that eliminates friction in scientific research, simulations, analysis, and decision‑making. The Director of OT Engineering, based in Spartanburg County, SC, will provide strategic and hands‑on technical leadership across the full OT infrastructure stack, partnering closely with the Director of OT Cybersecurity.

Responsibilities

• Define and execute the OT engineering strategy and multi‑year infrastructure roadmap, aligning technology investments with operational and security objectives.
• Provide senior technical leadership and people management to a team of OT infrastructure, endpoint, and systems engineers.
• Own the enterprise Active Directory and hybrid Azure AD / Entra ID architecture for OT environments, governing identity lifecycle, Group Policy, privileged access, and directory services integration.
• Lead IAM strategy for OT environments including RBAC, MFA, PAM, and service account governance.
• Oversee design, deployment, and management of security appliances within OT infrastructure: NGFWs, NAC, IPS, and web application firewalls.
• Direct the organization’s OT virtualization platforms including VMware vSphere/ESXi, Proxmox VE, and Kubernetes.
• Own the enterprise storage strategy for OT environments: SAN, NAS, object storage, and backup architectures.
• Ensure all engineering platforms comply with IEC 62443, NIST SP 800‑82, CIS Benchmarks, and organizational security policies.
• Lead infrastructure disaster recovery and business continuity planning, testing, and execution for OT systems.
• Collaborate with the Director of OT Cybersecurity to integrate engineering infrastructure into the broader OT security architecture.
• Manage vendor relationships, licensing, support contracts, and procurement.
• Establish and enforce change management, configuration management, and documentation standards.
• Drive team capability development through structured training, mentoring, and certification programs.
• Produce executive‑level reporting on infrastructure health, capacity, risk, and programme status.
• Lead cross‑functional engineering projects involving OT network, cybersecurity, endpoint, and operational teams.

Requirements

• 15+ years of infrastructure engineering experience; 8+ years in OT, ICS, or critical infrastructure in a senior or leadership capacity.
• Expert‑level Active Directory design, administration, and governance in OT environments.
• Deep experience with hybrid identity architectures: Azure AD / Entra ID, Conditional Access, Entra Connect, Privileged Identity Management.
• Demonstrated expertise designing security appliances in OT: NGFWs (FortiGate, Palo Alto), NAC, IPS.
• Expert‑level VMware vSphere/ESXi and/or Proxmox VE, including clustering, HA, and performance tuning.
• Strong knowledge of enterprise storage: SAN, NAS, Ceph, and backup/replication solutions.
• Experience managing Kubernetes in production OT or enterprise contexts.
• Understanding of OT/ICS network architecture, industrial protocols, and engineering constraints.
• Proven ability to lead, develop, and retain high‑performing engineering teams.
• Familiarity with IEC 62443, NIST SP 800‑82, and CIS Benchmarks.
• Preferred certifications: MCSE/modern Microsoft, VCP, CKA, CISSP, or equivalent.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, IT, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• Preferred experience with PAM platforms such as CyberArk, BeyondTrust, or FortiPAM in OT environments.
• Preferred familiarity with OpenStack or other private cloud platforms in OT contexts.
• Preferred hands‑on experience with observability stacks (Prometheus, Grafana, Elastic).
• Director‑level budget ownership and vendor negotiation experience (preferred).
• Experience within NERC CIP or IEC 62443 regulated environments (preferred).
• Must be legally authorized to work in the United States without employer sponsorship now or in the future.

Benefits & Perks

• Company‑paid lunch stipend (provided via GrubHub).
• 100% employer‑paid medical coverage in a High Deductible Health Plan, plus dental and vision for employees and families.
• 16 weeks of paid parental leave.
• Employee Assistance Program, life insurance, short‑term disability, and long‑term disability.
• 401(k) with company match of 100% of contributions up to 6%.
• Optional employee‑paid medical insurance (PPO) and additional benefits such as HSAs (with company contribution), FSAs, supplemental life insurance, Wellhub, and more.
• 25 days of paid time off plus 12 company holidays.