Sr. Director, Research Computing - Enterprise, Operations

University of Texas at San Antonio; San Antonio (TX); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

The University of Texas at San Antonio seeks a seasoned Senior Director for Research Computing to lead Enterprise Technology Services and to serve as the senior AI advisor for the university’s research enterprise. You will design a unified research computing catalog, set strategy for HPC and AI infrastructure, and partner with faculty and leadership to advance research across disciplines.

You will drive governance, secure environments for regulated data, and establish scalable, compliant

Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree in a related field required.
• Ten+ years in research computing, with leadership of multidisciplinary technical teams.
• Experience leading HPC/GPU/AI, cloud, and hybrid infrastructure.

Responsibilities

• Develops and implements a multi-year research computing strategy aligned with institutional priorities.
• Leads AI governance, strategy, and adoption across research, clinical, educational, and administrative functions.
• Owns design of a unified research computing service portfolio (HPC, AI/GPU, cloud, storage, software environments).
• Partners with investigators on grant proposals, providing facilities/resources language and infrastructure components.
• Oversees risk, security, and compliance for AI and research computing operations.

Skills

Leadership

Strategic Planning

Artificial Intelligence

Governance

Communication

Collaboration

Financial Acumen

Education

Bachelor's Degree in a related field

Job description

Sr. Director, Research Computing - Enterprise, Operations &Strategy

Location: San Antonio, TX

Regular/Temporary: Regular

Job ID: 16243

Full/Part Time: Full Time

Position Information

The University of Texas at San Antonio (UT SanAntonio) is a nationally recognized, top-tier public researchuniversity that unites the power of higher education, biomedicaldiscovery and healthcare within one visionary institution. As thethird-largest research university in Texas and a CarnegieR1-designated institution, UT San Antonio is a model of access andexcellence — advancing knowledge, social mobility and public healthacross South Texas and beyond. UT San Antonio serves approximately42,000 students in 320 academic programs spanning science,engineering, medicine, health, liberal arts, AI, cybersecurity,business, education and more. With 17,000 faculty and staff, UT SanAntonio has also been recognized as a Top Employer in Texas byForbes Magazine. Learn more online, on UT San Antonio Today or on X, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube or LinkedIn.

Salary Range: Commensurate with education,experience, and qualifications.

Job Type: Full Time

Posting Close Date: Applications will beaccepted through 11:59 PM CDT on 10/1/2026 . At the discretion ofthe hiring department, this posting may close once a sufficientnumber of qualified applications have been received.

Required Application Materials:

• Resume is required
• Cover letter is required.
• Contact information for three professional references.

Job Details

Job Summary

The Senior Director for Research Computing serves as theinstitution's senior leader within Enterprise Technology Servicesand the senior subject matter expert for artificial intelligence,responsible for building and leading the integrated researchcomputing function that powers the UT San Antonio comprehensiveresearch enterprise. As an information technology leader, therole serves and partners with Senior Leadership, Deans, principalinvestigators, and faculty as its primary customers, and worksalongside fellow Enterprise Technology Services leaders totranslate scientific ambition into reliable, well-governed,well-supported computing services.

The Senior Director will design and operate a unified researchcomputing service catalog that meets the needs of biomedicalinvestigators, clinical and translational scientists, AI and datascience researchers, cybersecurity scholars, engineers, and facultyacross the social sciences and humanities. The leader willset strategy for high-performance computing, GPU and AIinfrastructure, secure enclaves for regulated and controlled data,research data storage and management, scientific software, researchapplications, and the researcher-facing support and workforce thatsupports researchers at every stage of their work. Workingwith the Chief Information Officer, the Chief Information SecurityOfficer, clinical informatics leaders, faculty, and academicleadership, the Senior Director helps set enterprise AI strategy,governance, and standards that reach across the research, clinical,educational, and administrative missions, and positions theintegrated institution to adopt AI responsibly and at scale.

Core Responsibilities

1. Develops and implements a multi-year research computingstrategy aligned with institutional research priorities, partneringwith research leadership, deans, and faculty to support sponsoredresearch growth, faculty success, and emerging scientific andtechnology needs.
2. Serves as the institution's principal voice on researchcomputing, representing the integrated university to peerinstitutions, federal sponsors, the UT System, the Texas AdvancedComputing Center, national laboratories, and technology partners.
3. Serves as the institution's principal advisor on artificialintelligence, leading enterprise AI strategy, governance, andadoption across research, clinical, educational, and administrativefunctions while advising leadership on opportunities, risks, andevolving regulatory requirements.
4. Establishes and leads the institution's AI governanceframework, defining policies, standards, and oversight processes toensure responsible, secure, and compliant AI adoption across theenterprise.
5. Designs and manages a comprehensive research computing serviceportfolio, including HPC, AI/GPU, cloud, secure computing, dataservices, software support, training, and grant support, with clearservice, allocation, and funding models.
6. Establishes faculty engagement and research support programsthat expand access to advanced computing services, supportinvestigator success, and measure adoption, satisfaction, andresearch impact.
7. Partners with principal investigators on grant proposals,contributing facilities and resources language, letters of support,cost share modeling, and infrastructure components for majorfunding opportunities including NIH S10, NSF CC*, NSF MRI, and DODresearch instrumentation grants.
8. Leads the architecture, procurement, deployment, and lifecyclemanagement of institutional HPC and AI infrastructure, includingCPU clusters, GPU systems for training and inference, highthroughput and high bandwidth storage, scientific softwareenvironments, schedulers, and identity and allocation systems.
9. Optimizes the mix of on premises infrastructure, commercialcloud, and external HPC access through the Texas Advanced ComputingCenter, ACCESS, and DOE leadership facilities to deliver the bestprice, performance, and time to science for each class of workload.
10. Advances the institution's AI research infrastructure,including GPU, model development, and MLOps capabilities, whilepartnering with faculty and research leaders to strengthencompetitiveness for AI-focused research funding.
11. Establishes standards, governance, and lifecycle managementpractices for responsible AI development and deployment, enablingsecure, compliant, and scalable use of AI technologies acrossresearch and enterprise environments.
12. Builds and manages secure research computing environments forregulated and sensitive data, ensuring compliance with applicablerequirements and providing researchers with secure, audit-readysolutions throughout the data lifecycle.
13. Establishes research data management services, includingstorage, archival, data sharing, metadata, and FAIR data practices,while supporting compliance with federal data management andsharing requirements.
14. Develops and maintains research data governance policies fordata classification, stewardship, retention, sharing, andprovenance in partnership with research and compliancestakeholders.
15. Establishes governance standards for AI training and evaluationdata, including provenance, consent, quality, de-identification,and appropriate use.
16. Partners with information security leadership to strengthen thesecurity and compliance of research computing services, ensuringreadiness for audits, certifications, and sponsorrequirements.
17. Builds the institutional capability to support classified orsensitive cleared research as the research portfolio grows indefense, intelligence, and homeland security domains. Ensuresthat research computing services are designed with security andcompliance as embedded properties rather than after the factadditions.
18. Leads the management of AI specific risk in partnership withthe Chief Information Security Officer, privacy officers, andcompliance leaders.
19. Translates sponsor requirements into clear guidance, services,and controls that researchers can adopt without becoming complianceexperts themselves.
20. Develops a coherent hybrid infrastructure strategy thatintegrates on premises systems, commercial cloud services throughenterprise agreements with AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, andOracle Cloud, and external HPC capacity through TACC, ACCESS, andpartner institutions.
21. Establishes institutional cloud landing zones for research thatprovide preconfigured network segmentation, identity integration,cost controls, security baselines, and data egress governance.
22. Leads capital planning for research computing facilities,including data center capacity, power, cooling, networking, andphysical security, and coordinate with facilities, real estate, andinfrastructure partners to align research computing growth withinstitutional master planning.
23. Makes research computing accessible to investigators andtrainees at every career stage and from every discipline.
24. Recruits, develops, and retains a research computing workforceand partners with academic departments to create joint appointmentsand internship pipelines.
25. Advances AI literacy and enablement across theinstitution.
26. Cultivates a service environment grounded in responsiveness,scientific curiosity, and genuine partnership with faculty.
27. Owns the resilience strategy for research computing services,ensuring readiness to withstand, respond to, and recover fromdisruptions and major events.
28. Leads resilience testing for research computing, includingrecovery exercises and failure simulations that validate readinessand response effectiveness. Drives continuous improvement inrecovery time and recovery point objectives for critical researchdata and infrastructure, and gives research and IT leadership aclear view of resilience posture and remediation progress.
29. Coordinates response and recovery during major incidentsaffecting research computing, including executive communication,prioritization, and restoration of service.
30. Identifies and manages risks arising from research computingoperations and strategic initiatives.
31. Oversees resilience and risk requirements for critical thirdparties and vendors that support research computing, includingcloud providers, external high performance computing partners, andscientific software suppliers, so that key dependencies do notbecome single points of failure.
32. Advances execution discipline and program governance forresearch computing investments and capital programs, and drivesorganizational preparedness through training, awareness, andreadiness exercises for research computing staff and theinvestigators they support.
33. Operates the research computing function with disciplinedfinancial management, sustainable funding models, and transparentbusiness practices.
34. Establishes service level commitments, performance metrics, andregular reporting to research and IT leadership. Uses metricsto inform investment decisions, retire underused services, andprioritize the work that produces the greatest scientificreturn.
35. Maintains a forward looking technology roadmap that anticipatesthe next three to five years of scientific computing, AI, and datainfrastructure needs, and presents that roadmap regularly toexecutive leadership and research stakeholders.
36. Performs other duties as assigned.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree in a related field.
• Ten (10) years of progressive experience in research computing,scientific computing, research informatics, or a closely relatedfield, including a minimum of five years leading multidisciplinarytechnical teams that support faculty researchers.
• Demonstrated experience leading research computingenvironments, including HPC, GPU, AI, cloud, and hybridinfrastructure.
• Proven ability to support secure research operations involvingregulated or controlled data, develop sustainable service deliveryand funding models, and partner with researchers on sponsored grantproposals.
• Experience with operational resilience, disaster recovery, andcritical infrastructure management.
• Knowledge of AI strategy, governance, risk management, andresponsible AI practices in research, academic, or healthcareenvironments.
• This position may require the ability to maintain the securityand integrity of UT San Antonio and its infrastructure per TexasEO-GA-48.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Vision
• Leadership
• Strategic Planning
• Influence
• Communication
• Collaboration
• Credibility
• Stewardship
• Financial-Acumen
• Innovation
• Artificial-Intelligence
• Governance
• Risk-Management
• Change-Leadership
• Research-Enablement

Working Conditions

• Office Environment. Ability to travel to and from meetings,training sessions or other business-related events. After hours andweekend work is required on an occasional basis. Occasional afterhours and weekend work or overtime may be required.

Physical Demands

• Sedentary work; sitting most of the time. Jobs are sedentary,if walking and standing are required, only occasionally. Exerts upto 10 lbs. of force occasional.

This position will work primarily on campus.Travel and parking expenses are the employee's responsibility.

This position is contingent upon a successful background check.Verification of a valid driver's license and Motor Vehicle Record(MVR) may be completed as applicable. Applicants selected must beable to show proof of eligibility to work in the United States bytime of hire.

Equal Employment Opportunity

As an equal employment opportunity and affirmative actionemployer, it is the policy of The University of Texas at SanAntonio to promote and ensure equal employment opportunity for allindividuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, genderidentity, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability orgenetic information, and veteran status. The University iscommitted to the Affrontive Action Program in compliance with allgovernment requirements to ensure nondiscrimination.