Sr. Staff Engineer, Data Center

Linkedin3; Manassas (VA); Hybrid; USD 130,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

LinkedIn is seeking a Data Center Engineer to design, build, and maintain critical data center infrastructure across multiple sites including Mountain View, Hillsboro, Richardson, Plano, and Manassas. The role supports safety, reliability, and efficiency while collaborating with providers and internal teams.

Responsibilities include site selection, due diligence, standardization of designs, and oversight of commissioning and IST to meet high availability targets.

Responsibilities

• Lead site selection and technical evaluation of data center engineering documents, expansions, and data hall fit-outs, including review of electrical one-line diagrams, mechanical system designs, and infrastructure layouts.
• Partner with data center providers to define, measure, and enforce lease SLAs; assess power and cooling capacity; and ensure compliance with LinkedIn's redundancy, resiliency, and availability standards.
• Lead technical due diligence and infrastructure negotiations for colocation leases, amendments, and expansions.
• Translate business and capacity requirements into enforceable technical provisions covering capacity delivery, system performance, demarcation of responsibilities, commissioning, maintenance, reporting, emergency response, and service-level remedies.
• Develop and maintain system-level resiliency and redundancy models that define load distribution, failover sequences, and power/cooling interdependencies to ensure infrastructure designs meet LinkedIn's Tier-level and N+X performance criteria.
• Oversee the design and construction of new data centers, expansions, and retrofits, ensuring that electrical and mechanical systems meet design intent, testing protocols, commissioning standards, and overall project delivery timelines.
• Lead LinkedIn's liquid-cooling deployment strategy by assessing direct-to-chip cooling technologies, comparing performance tradeoffs and operational impacts, and providing data-driven recommendations to leadership for scalable implementation.
• Create appropriate metrics and tools to support system monitoring and maintenance.
• Perform and review advanced electrical and mechanical calculations and analyses, including load flow, short-circuit, coordination, arc-flash, and CFD modeling, to validate system performance and capacity under normal and failure conditions.
• Lead data center design standardization efforts, including the development, maintenance, and continuous improvement of global Basis of Design (BOD) documentation.
• Define and update owner's requirements, design drawings, technical specifications, bills of materials, and performance benchmarks to ensure consistency across regions and providers.
• Lead and oversee commissioning and Integrated Systems Testing (IST) of new data center spaces, retrofits, and upgrades, verifying end-to-end system performance against design specifications and operational requirements.
• Evaluate, qualify, and approve new electrical and mechanical systems, equipment, and components, including vendor qualification and product testing, to ensure standardization, performance, and long-term reliability across the global data center fleet.
• Develop and validate operational-readiness requirements, failure-response procedures, escalation paths, and contingency plans for new and existing infrastructure.
• Partner with operations teams and data center providers to ensure personnel, documentation, spare parts, monitoring, and response capabilities are in place before production deployment.

Job description

At LinkedIn, our approach to flexible work is centered on trust and optimized for culture, connection, clarity, and the evolving needs of our business. The work location of this role is hybrid, meaning it will be performed both from home and from a LinkedIn office on select days, as determined by the business needs of the team.

This role will be based in Mountain View, CA, Hillsboro, OR, Richardson, TX, Plano, TX or Manassas, VA.

The Data Center Engineering (DCE) team designs, builds, commissions and supports the lifecycle management of the physical facilities and infrastructure that enable critical IT systems, applications, and data. The team leads site and technical evaluations, develops global engineering standards, supports colocation lease requirements, and oversees the design, construction, commissioning, operational readiness, and maintenance of data center infrastructure. Data Center Engineers ensure the safety, stability, reliability, resiliency, security, and efficiency of data center operations to meet stringent availability and performance targets. They also lead root cause analysis (RCA) investigations, drive corrective actions and continuous improvements, and collaborate closely with colocation providers, design consultants, contractors, equipment manufacturers, and internal stakeholders while enforcing applicable safety codes, industry standards, and engineering best practices.

Mechanical and Electrical (M&E) Engineers within the DCE team apply deep electrical and mechanical engineering expertise across power, cooling, controls, and emerging high-density infrastructure technologies, including liquid cooling. They evaluate, design, construct, commission, operate, and maintain resilient and scalable data center facilities while balancing technical performance, energy efficiency, operational risk, maintainability, cost, and long-term capacity requirements.

Responsibilities include:

• Lead site selection and technical evaluation of data center engineering documents, expansions, and data hall fit-outs, including review of electrical one-line diagrams, mechanical system designs, and infrastructure layouts. Partner with data center providers to define, measure, and enforce lease SLAs; assess power and cooling capacity; and ensure compliance with LinkedIn's redundancy, resiliency, and availability standards.


• Lead technical due diligence and infrastructure negotiations for colocation leases, amendments, and expansions. Translate business and capacity requirements into enforceable technical provisions covering capacity delivery, system performance, demarcation of responsibilities, commissioning, maintenance, reporting, emergency response, and service-level remedies.


• Develop and maintain system-level resiliency and redundancy models that define load distribution, failover sequences, and power/cooling interdependencies to ensure infrastructure designs meet LinkedIn's Tier-level and N+X performance criteria.


• Oversee the design and construction of new data centers, expansions, and retrofits, ensuring that electrical and mechanical systems meet design intent, testing protocols, commissioning standards, and overall project delivery timelines.


• Lead LinkedIn's liquid-cooling deployment strategy by assessing direct-to-chip cooling technologies, comparing performance tradeoffs and operational impacts, and providing data-driven recommendations to leadership for scalable implementation. Create appropriate metrics and tools to support system monitoring and maintenance.


• Perform and review advanced electrical and mechanical calculations and analyses, including load flow, short-circuit, coordination, arc-flash, and CFD modeling, to validate system performance and capacity under normal and failure conditions.


• Lead data center design standardization efforts, including the development, maintenance, and continuous improvement of global Basis of Design (BOD) documentation. Define and update owner's requirements, design drawings, technical specifications, bills of materials, and performance benchmarks to ensure consistency across regions and providers.


• Lead and oversee commissioning and Integrated Systems Testing (IST) of new data center spaces, retrofits, and upgrades, verifying end-to-end system performance against design specifications and operational requirements.


• Evaluate, qualify, and approve new electrical and mechanical systems, equipment, and components, including vendor qualification and product testing, to ensure standardization, performance, and long-term reliability across the global data center fleet.


• Develop and validate operational-readiness requirements, failure-response procedures, escalation paths, and contingency plans for new and existing infrastructure. Partner with operations teams and data center providers to ensure personnel, documentation, spare parts, monitoring, and response capabilities are in place before production deployment.


• Develop and manage a comprehensive preventive and corrective maintena