Data Center Manager

Florida Legislature; Tallahassee (FL); On-site; USD 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

The Florida Legislature is seeking an experienced Data Center Manager to lead the OLITS Infrastructure and Operations division, ensuring stability, reliability, and efficiency of day-to-day infrastructure. You will supervise Customer Support, Systems Administration, Networking, and Data Center Facilities teams, acting as the trusted deputy to the CIO for infrastructure operations.

This role emphasizes operational discipline, lifecycle planning, risk awareness, and collaboration with executive

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, MIS, or engineering with at least 6 years of information systems experience.
• At least 2 years in a managerial or supervisory role.
• Experience can substitute for education on a year-for-year basis up to ten years.

Responsibilities

• Provide operational oversight across infrastructure teams: Customer Support, Systems Administration, Networking, and Data Center Facilities.
• Coordinate day-to-day operations to ensure reliability, performance, and service continuity across all infrastructure services.
• Serve as the primary escalation point for operational incidents and cross-team issues.
• Participate in performance evaluations and align team priorities and workload distribution.
• Develop and enforce operational standards, runbooks, and change coordination processes.
• Coordinate maintenance windows, system changes, and infrastructure cutovers to minimize disruption.
• Own lifecycle planning activities: lifecycle schedules, multi-year reinvestment planning, and asset risk tracking.
• Assist in development of infrastructure lifecycle reinvestment budgets with leadership.
• Collaborate on infrastructure design decisions impacting data center and enterprise systems.
• Ensure readiness and accuracy of backup, DR, and COOP capabilities and documentation.
• Support cloud integration initiatives, including hybrid and Azure-based environments.
• Identify operational risks and implement mitigation strategies to improve resilience.
• Participate in CJIS and NIST framework alignment and remediation of audit findings.
• Provide regular operational status updates to leadership and keep abreast of emerging technologies.

Skills

Leadership

Decision making

Incident management

Cross-team coordination

Communication

Operational discipline

Risk assessment

Problem solving

Organizational skills

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS, MIS or Engineering

Job description

The Florida Legislature is seeking an experienced and operationally focused Data Center Manager to support the Office of Legislative Information Technology Services (OLITS) Infrastructure and Operations division. This position services as a key operational leader responsible for ensuring the stability, reliability, and effectiveness of day-to-day infrastructure operations. Working under the direction of the Deputy Chief Information Officer for Infrastructure and Operations, this role provides oversight across Customer Support, Systems Administration, Networking, and the Data Center Facilities teams to ensure coordinated execution of operational priorities. The Data Center Manager functions as a trusted second in command of operational activities, leading cross-team coordination, managing escalations, and ensuring that services are delivered efficiently and consistently. This position emphasizes operational discipline, risk awareness, and lifecycle planning while enabling executive leadership to focus on strategic initiatives.

• Provide operational oversight across infrastructure teams, including Customer Support, Systems Administration, Networking, and Data Center Facilities
• Coordinate day-to-day operations to ensure reliability, performance, and service continuity across all infrastructure services
• Serve as the primary escalation point for operational incidents and cross-team issues
• Participate in performance evaluations of working managers and assist in aligning team priorities, goals, and workload distribution
• Facilitate cross-team collaboration to resolve conflicts, improve processes, and ensure consistent service delivery
• Develop, maintain and enforce operational standards, procedures, and runbooks
• Coordinate maintenance windows, system changes, and infrastructure cutovers to minimize disruption
• Own and manage lifecycle planning activities, including:
  • Maintaining lifecycle schedules
  • Coordinating multi-year reinvestment planning
  • Tracking asset age, risk exposure, and refresh timelines
• Assist in development of infrastructure lifecycle reinvestment budgets in coordination with leadership
• Collaborate on infrastructure design decisions impacting the data center and enterprise systems
• Ensure readiness and accuracy of backup, disaster recovery (DR), and continuity of operations (COOP) capabilities and documentation
• Support cloud integration initiatives, including hybrid and Azure-based environments
• Identify operational risks and implement mitigation strategies to improve system resilience and reliability
• Participate in compliance related activities, including alignment with CJIS and NIST frameworks and remediation of audit findings
• Provide regular operational status updates and briefing to leadership
• Maintain awareness of emerging technologies and operational best practices
• Perform other related duties as required

• Strong leadership and decision-making skills in operational environments
• Ability to remain calm and effective under pressure during incidents and escalations
• Strong process-oriented mindset with the ability to improve operational efficiency
• Ability to coordinate and align multiple teams toward shared objectives
• Ability to analyze complex operational issues and implement practical solutions
• Ability to communicate technical operational information clearly and effectively
• Ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships across teams and leadership
• Strong organizational skills and attention to detail

A bachelor's degree from an accredited college or university in computer science, management information systems, or engineering and six years of progressively responsible information systems experience, two years of which must have been in a managerial or supervisory capacity. Progressively responsible information systems experience can substitute on a year-for-year basis for the required college education. Any combination of progressively responsible information systems experience and post-secondary training in disciplines as described above totaling ten years.

Preferred Qualifications

Preference will be given to applicants with the following:

• Extensive experience in infrastructure operations leadership across multiple technical domains
• Experience overseeing and coordinating cross-functional IT teams in an operational environment
• Knowledge of backup disaster recovery (DR), and continuity of operations (COOP) planning and execution
• Experience supporting hybrid cloud environments, including Microsoft Azure integrations
• Experience developing and managing lifecycle refresh and reinvestment planning
• Knowledge of operational risk identification and mitigation strategies
• Familiarity with CJIS and NIST frameworks
• Experience developing operational documentation, runbooks, and standards
• Strong understanding of enterprise IT operations, including incident management, change coordination, and service delivery