Operations Manager-Linux & Network

Operations Manager – On-Premise Infrastructure (Linux & Network)

Location Brussels-50% onsite

Contract 6-12 months contract (potential extensions)

On-callYes (24/7 escalation rota)

About the role

We are looking for an Operations Manager to take over leadership of the team that runs our on-premise infrastructure: the Linux server estate, virtualisation, storage and the network elements that underpin mission-critical services. These services run 24/7 and downtime has real operational consequences.

The role has two halves. First, own and tighten day-to-day operations: incident, change and configuration control, ITSM discipline in ServiceNow, and a team that knows exactly what is running, where, and why. Second, be the operational anchor for the move of this landscape away from on-premise hosting towards VMware-based cloud platforms (Azure VMware Solution or Amazon Elastic VMware Service). The migration programme is led elsewhere; this role brings the knowledge of the estate into it, sets the conditions under which the target platform is accepted into operations, and then runs it — while keeping the current estate stable throughout.

This is a hands-on management role for someone who is meticulous by nature, treats production with respect, and considers "we don't know" an unacceptable answer about a mission-critical system.

The environment

• On-premise data-centre infrastructure supporting 24/7 operational services
• Linux server estate (enterprise distributions), VMware-based virtualisation, storage and backup
• Network elements: switching, routing, firewalls, load balancers, DNS/DHCP/NTP, network segmentation
• ITSM on ServiceNow: incident, problem, change, configuration (CMDB), knowledge
• Target state: hybrid, then cloud-hosted VMware (AVS / EVS) with on-premise decommissioning — delivered by a migration programme that this role supports and takes into operations

Key responsibilities

Run the platform

• Own end-to-end availability, performance and security posture of the on-premise Linux and network infrastructure against agreed SLAs/OLAs
• Ensure patching, hardening, backup/restore and disaster-recovery procedures are defined, scheduled, executed and evidenced — not assumed
• Manage infrastructure lifecycle: obsolescence tracking, hardware/software refresh, vendor support contracts and licences

Own the process

• Act as process owner for infrastructure Change, Incident, Problem and Configuration Management in ServiceNow; chair or co-chair the Change Advisory Board for infrastructure changes
• Enforce change control: every production change has a risk assessment, test evidence, a rollback plan and an approval trail
• Keep the CMDB accurate and complete for the infrastructure estate and make it the single source of truth
• Own major incident management for infrastructure: incident command, communication, post-incident review, and problem management through to root cause and permanent fix

Lead the team

• Lead, prioritise and develop the infrastructure team (Linux and network engineers): workload, on-call rota, skills and performance
• Set clear standards for documentation, runbooks and operational procedures, and make sure they are followed

Control and report

• Define and track operational KPIs (availability, incident volume and MTTR, change success rate, patch compliance, backup success, capacity headroom) and report regularly to management
• Maintain the infrastructure risk register and drive mitigations; support security, audit and compliance reviews with evidence

Support the transition and take the target state into operations

• Be the source of truth on the current estate for the migration programme: inventory, dependencies, configurations, constraints and operational risks — and make sure migration planning is built on it
• Review migration and target designs from an operations standpoint: supportability, monitoring, backup/DR, access, network and security controls, ITSM and CMDB integration
• Define and enforce operational acceptance criteria for the AVS/EVS landscape: no workload is accepted into operations without runbooks, monitoring, backup, DR evidence, CMDB entries and trained on-call
• Prepare the team and the operating model for the target platform: skills, procedures, on-call, vendor and cloud-provider support paths
• Support cutovers from the operations side, run hyper-care, and execute on-premise decommissioning through formal change control
• Run hybrid operations during the transition without degrading service levels

Must-have experience and skills

• 8+ years in infrastructure operations, including 3+ years leading an infrastructure team in a 24/7, mission-critical or regulated environment (e.g. aviation, energy/utilities, telecom, finance, defence, healthcare)
• Strong Linux operations background (RHEL/SUSE or similar): patching, hardening, configuration management, troubleshooting
• Solid networking knowledge: TCP/IP, routing and switching, firewalls, load balancing, DNS, segmentation — enough to review designs, challenge network engineers and lead a network incident
• Virtualisation operations (VMware vSphere), storage and backup fundamentals
• Expert-level ITSM practitioner: ITIL-based operations with proven ownership of Change, Incident, Problem and Configuration Management
• Expert-level ServiceNow user and process owner: ITSM modules, CMDB, SLAs, reporting and dashboards; able to specify and validate workflow configuration with ServiceNow administrators
• Experience of moving an on-premise VMware estate to a cloud VMware platform (AVS, EVS or equivalent such as Google Cloud VMware Engine) from the operations side — discovery and dependency mapping, operational readiness, cutover support, hyper-care — and of operating the target platform afterwards
• Working knowledge of Azure or AWS core services (networking, identity, connectivity) sufficient to operate a hybrid landscape and a cloud-hosted VMware platform
• Fluent English, written and spoken; able to report clearly to senior management and non-technical stakeholders

Nice to have

• ITIL 4 Managing Professional, or ITIL 4 Foundation with practitioner modules
• ServiceNow certifications (CSA, CIS-ITSM)
• VMware VCP; Azure (AZ-104 / AZ-305) or AWS Solutions Architect; CCNA/CCNP or equivalent
• Exposure to VMware HCX and cloud-VMware networking (network extension, ExpressRoute / Direct Connect)
• Automation and observability tooling: Ansible, Terraform, Bash/Python, Zabbix/Nagios/Prometheus/Grafana, ELK
• Experience with information-security frameworks and audits (ISO 27001, NIS2) and with data-centre operations

Who you are

• Mission-critical mindset: you assume production is fragile until proven otherwise, and you plan for failure before it happens
• Meticulous and control-oriented: you check, you verify, you insist on evidence and you keep records — nothing changes in production without a plan, a review and a rollback path
• Calm and decisive under pressure; you take command of an incident rather than waiting to be asked
• Structured communicator who gives management a clear picture — including bad news, early
• Comfortable holding engineers, vendors and a migration programme to operational standards without doing their job for them

Working conditions

• Participation in the 24/7 on-call escalation rota as infrastructure incident manager
• Occasional out-of-hours work for maintenance windows and migration cutovers
• Location on-site-Brussels- hybrid 50%