Senior Platform Engineering Director

Record your short intro here — tell us about your platform engineering leadership background and the most comparable hypervisor or hyperscaler modernization you’ve led (scope, scale, and outcomes) Sr. Director of Platform Engineering (Hypervisor & Infrastructure Modernization) Location: Cincinnati, OH (Onsite — relocation available; local candidates strongly preferred) Employment Type: Direct Hire Compensation: $200,000 - $350,000 Benefits: Health, Dental, Vision, 401(k) match, PTO, Paid Holidays, Employee programs (standard corporate package) Travel: As needed (enterprise sites / data centers) Start: ASAP Open Role Due To: Platform modernization initiative (hypervisor replacement + hybrid transformation) About the Role Our fortune 20 client is seeking a Sr. Director of Platform Engineering to provide strategy, vision, leadership, and direction for a highly scaled enterprise infrastructure environment. This role leads the architecture, engineering, and operations of enterprise compute platforms supporting 70,000+ physical and virtual servers across data centers, stores, fuel distribution, manufacturing/food plants, and e-commerce. The immediate priority is a major hypervisor modernization effort—migrating from VMware ESXi to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) running KVM, with hybrid hyperscaler (Azure/AWS/GCP) experience considered a strong adjacent background if the scale and rigor are comparable. What You’ll Do Define and lead the vision, strategy, and roadmap for infrastructure/platform engineering to enable growth and digital transformation Lead a large-scale hypervisor migration program: including architecture decisions, sequencing, and risk management Own platform strategy for bare metal + virtualization: compute, storage, networking, identity, backup, observability, and automation Establish and enforce infrastructure standards (global configuration baselines, vendor guidelines, lifecycle management, and security controls) Drive operational excellence for HA/DR, capacity planning, performance, patching, incident response, and reliability engineering Partner with security, networking, app teams, and enterprise architecture to ensure platforms are secure, resilient, and cost-effective Manage large budgets; lead vendor relationships, negotiations, and contract outcomes tied to business value Build, coach, and develop leaders and engineers—fostering accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement Why This Role Stands Out Owns a highly visible modernization initiative replacing a core enterprise hypervisor layer at massive scale Direct impact on reliability and performance across stores, distribution, manufacturing, and e-commerce Onsite executive leadership role with broad influence across infrastructure strategy, standards, and operations Competitive executive compensation (base + bonus + equity) with full benefits What We’re Looking For 10+ years leading large, interdisciplinary infrastructure teams and complex, multi-stakeholder initiatives 5+ years delivering innovative infrastructure solutions, with strong understanding of industry trends and competitive landscape Proven success driving organizational change, shaping technology vision, and strengthening architecture and operational practices Demonstrated ability to build, mentor, and lead high-performing, inclusive teams Strong executive communication skills (strategic documentation; presenting technical concepts to non-technical audiences) Expertise in business case development, initiative scoping, and program planning with engineering stakeholders Deep technical knowledge across enterprise compute platforms, including: hypervisor/virtualization (VMware ESXi/vSphere, KVM, Hyper‑V), bare metal lifecycle, storage (SAN/NAS/object), backup/data protection, virtualization networking fundamentals, and HA/DR design/operations Experience managing Cloud and On‑Prem Identity Management environments Strong influencing and negotiation skills across all organizational levels and external vendors Preferred Skills Direct experience leading VMware ESXi → KVM (or ESXi → hyperscaler) migrations at enterprise scale SUSE Linux Enterprise Server experience; familiarity with Rancher/Kubernetes (running natively on SLES/Rancher or on VMs) Hybrid/multi‑cloud exposure (Azure/AWS/GCP) with understanding of how IaaS replaces/extends on‑prem virtualization patterns Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, IT, or related field #J-18808-Ljbffr Gentis Solutions