Director, It Operations Na

Descartes Unites the People and Technology that Move the World
The need for efficient, secure, and agile supply chains and logistics operations has become ever more critical and complex. By combining innovative technology, powerful trade intelligence and the reach of our network, Descartes helps get goods, information, transportation assets, and people where they’re needed, when they’re needed.

We’re one of the most broadly deployed logistics and supply chain technology companies in the world. More than 22,000 customers around the globe use our cloud-based solutions to transform the way they move inventory and information to enhance productivity, better serve customers, thrive competitively, keep pace with evolving regulations, and respond to rapidly changing market conditions. Descartes is publicly traded (Nasdaq:DSGX, TSX:DSG) with headquarters in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and offices and partners around the world. With record financial performance for more than 16 years, we lead the industry in innovation investment. Every day, logistics service providers, manufacturers, retailers, distributors, and other logistics-intensive businesses of all sizes rely on our scale, stability, and comprehensive solution footprint to move what’s most important to them. Learn more at www.descartes.com.

We’re growing fast and invite you to join our amazing team.

The opportunity
Reporting to the SVP IT Services, we are seeking a Director, IT Operations to own and lead the execution of our IT roadmap. You will oversee the 24/7 network operations centre, various Infrastructure teams and drive strategic projects. From supporting our North American Data Centres, ensuring teams operate collaboratively with a global lens, and overseeing the timely response to technical issues and critical incidents, this is an opportunity to make a measurable business impact on our IT operations and, ultimately, customer satisfaction. You will play a critical role in our transformation from traditional data centre infrastructure to a highly automated DevOps framework.

What’s in it for you
Exposure and influence. You are looking for an opportunity to move into a role where you can introduce efficiency, apply insights, and implement scalability and best practices in the journey towards DevOps. You want to join an established, growing company solving global supply chain problems with cutting-edge solutions. You want to expand your accountability and ownership to lead an exciting organizational transformation and make a tangible difference, building a path to modernization with measurable outcomes.
Professional advancement and autonomy. At Descartes, we value the contributions that each of our employees makes towards achieving our corporate goals. We strive to ensure that each team member has the tools and support they need to make valuable contributions. You will be an active contributor amongst globally recognized industry leaders, including the SVP, who is committed to mentorship, guidance, and giving you the independence to lead your work and accomplish your goals.
What you will do:

• Be the voice of innovation and stability. You will be forward-thinking and strategic from day one. You will apply your in-depth knowledge and skills to provide technical and team-level oversight, prioritizing availability and resilience – and evolving to automation and DevOps. You will manage resources and technological objectives to deliver on business and financial goals. You will ensure all IT initiatives are completed as proposed and quality is achieved. Your project work may include:
• Optimizing security within the data centres. You will partner with Security to implement a proactive and reactive response existing and emerging threats.
• Consolidating management of new data centres. You will establish a core set of processes to standardize the management of technology acquired through the onboarding of new companies every year.
• Building a stronger identity access management framework.
• Managing and mitigating risk for any legacy technology stacks and products.
• Establishing an evaluation framework to prioritize IT projects, balancing urgency, speed, and costs.
• Advise senior leaders. You will be the first point of contact, operate at a group and enterprise-wide level, and serve as a specialist with insights and analytics to inform and guide decision-makers and stakeholders.
• Continuous improvement. You will assess our current state, processes, and tools, to recommend automations, improvements, updates, and re-align our traditional data centres with an automated cloud infrastructure. You will research technology trends, tools, and best practices.
• Manage the team. You will foster a culture of collaboration within and across groups and ensure engagement and satisfaction within your team.

What you bring:

• The education and experience. You have a degree in Information Systems, Computer Science, or the equivalent work experience. You have 10 years of progressive experience in technology, including 5+ years leading a 24/7 IT Operations team responding to urgent changes and downtime incidents. You have expertise in the development and/or deployment of tools, trends, and methodologies, combined with your broader understanding of IT services and cloud infrastructure fundamentals. You have been part of a transition, in some capacity, to the cloud and highly automated DevOps.
• The project management. You have experience planning and delivering complex implementation projects, from the proposal and budget to resources and timing of deliverables.
• The people leadership. You can direct the work of a large, diverse team, remove roadblocks, manage conflict, and identify gaps in skills and resources to effectively manage the team’s work. You practice active listening and empathetic engagement across diverse perspectives. You are a champion of your team and your own ideas, able to adopt the best idea but defend your own choices.
• The drive. You are tenacious and have finely tuned troubleshooting abilities, diving into problems, analyzing situations, and innovating solutions. You continuously pursue new technologies and can quickly learn new tools.
• The interpersonal skills. You have flexible and effective communication skills. You can build strong internal and external relationships and engage stakeholders at all levels.

Location; This is a remote opportunity, open to applicants authorized to work in Canada.

Join Us
As we scale, we’re looking for new doers, collaborators and innovators to join Descartes in uniting the people and technology that move the world as the Global Leader in Logistics and Supply Chain Technology. We’re entrepreneurial, hardworking, geeky-in-a-good way problem solvers. Guided by our values, we nurture a TEAM focused culture that invests in people and creates opportunities for advancement across a broad spectrum of career paths. We prioritize work-life balance and foster an environment with the space to take ownership, to be heard, and to carve a path for your individual accomplishments to help drive our success. At Descartes, everyone has a voice and the best idea wins, regardless of who makes it. We offer competitive compensation, great benefits, remote and flexible work hours, and the opportunity to join a company on an awesome mission with a great existing team and trajectory.

Descartes also has a deep sense of environmental responsibility. Learn more about how we helped our customers save over 552,000 metric tons of CO2 in 2020 by reducing fuel and paper consumption: https://www.descartes.com/who-we-are/social-responsibility-sustainability/environmental-impact. Join a team that’s committed to working with customers to conserve resources and enhance sustainability.

If you feel you have 70% of the qualifications we are looking for, and Descartes sounds like the team and the mission you want to be part of, apply now. We can’t promise it will be a fit, but we do promise to consider your experience.

Through COVID-19, we implemented a virtual hiring process and continue to interview and onboard candidates by video using Microsoft TEAMS. We record interviews and use them strictly for quality assurance, training and general record keeping purposes. Should you have any questions about this process, please connect with our hiring team in advance of scheduled interviews. We value the safety of each member of our community because we know we’re all in this together.

We are an Equal Employment employer. We do not discriminate in hiring on the basis of sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, color, religious creed, national origin, physical or mental disability, protected status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, provincial, or local law. For more information about our commitment to equal employment opportunity, please review our Code of Business Conduct and Ethics at Descartes.com. Descartes is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to job applicants with disabilities. Applicants in North America with a disability who require a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or hiring process can email us at hrna@descartes.com. Provide your name and contact information along with the accommodation needed to assist you with the application process. Your request will be responded to as soon as possible. Reasonable accommodations will be determined on a case-by-case basis.