Research Facility IT Services, Manager

Department: IT Research Computing Services

Salary/Grade: ITS/83

Target hiring range for this position will be between $125,220-153,000 per year. Offered salary will be determined by the applicant's education, experience, knowledge, skills and abilities, as well as internal equity and alignment with market data

Job Summary:

The Research Facility IT Services Manager leads a coordinated service model for Information Technology support across core facilities, research centers, and complex laboratory environments.

The role manages staff who design, configure, and operate technology to enable research compliance with institutional standards, data management requirements, and operational best practices. This includes endpoint configuration and support, data workflow and storage design and implementation, and inventory and exception management. This team will also partner with other NUIT units to coordinate the delivery of other research-related technology services.

The manager sets priorities, oversees service delivery, develops staff, establishes consistent operating practices, and partners with researchers, facility leaders, vendors, cybersecurity, endpoint management, research computing, and other IT service providers. The role aligns services with institutional standards, University priorities, security expectations, compliance requirements, and sustainable operating practices.

Please note: Normal office working conditions without extreme environments. The role may require occasional work in research facilities, laboratories, or specialized technology environments to understand requirements, coordinate support, or respond to service needs.

Specific Responsibilities:

• Lead and manage senior research facility support specialists and endpoint technicians in support of core and research facilities, centers, and complex lab environments.
• Set team priorities, allocate resources, monitor service delivery, and ensure timely of operational and project work. Evaluate risks and plan for operational resilience.
• Provide staff supervision, coaching, performance management, and professional development.
• Develop and maintain service models, operating procedures, documentation standards, intake processes, and escalation pathways.
• Drive continuous improvement of service standards, workflow templates, and implementation practices that improve consistency, sustainability, scalability, and supportability.
• Partner and coordinate implementation work with researchers, core facility leaders, vendors, cybersecurity, endpoint management, research computing, storage, networking, and other IT service teams.
• Translate research, compliance, security, and operational requirements into service plans and measurable outcomes.
• Oversee delivery of services to standardize and secure data and workflows for research cores and facilities, navigating complex research environments. Environments may include instrument-attached workstations, legacy devices, constrained access environments, cloud-enabled workflows, data movement, endpoint management, and multiple storage environments.
• Maintain accurate inventory of supported endpoints, instruments, and storage allocations, and administer the exception and risk-acceptance process for systems that cannot meet standard configuration requirements, including documentation of compensating controls.
• Guide facilities in the adoption of appropriate research data storage, data transfer tools, staging, sharing, retention, archival, and endpoint management services.
• Ensure team practices align with information security, regulated-data, and institutional standards, including such as CUI, NIST 800-171, and related frameworks when appropriate.
• Develop service metrics and reporting that communicate workload, progress, risks, service outcomes, and resource needs to technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Oversee user-facing and internal documentation, onboarding resources, training, and service guidance.
• Manage escalations, service disruptions, vendor dependencies, and cross-team coordination challenges.
• Serve as an escalation point for security incidents, data loss events, and compliance exceptions affecting supported environments, coordinating containment, response, and reporting with the Information Security Office in accordance with institutional policy.
• Foster a collaborative, service-oriented team culture focused on reliability, responsiveness, continuous improvement, and effective partnership with the research community.

Miscellaneous

Performs other duties as assigned.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Education: Bachelor's degree in a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and experience.

• Experience: Five or more years of experience in research computing, academic research, scientific laboratories, core facilities, data-intensive environments, endpoint support, or comparable technical service environments.

• Leadership: Three or more years of experience supervising, managing, mentoring, or leading technical staff, including demonstrated ability to manage workload, priorities, staffing capacity, service delivery, and stakeholder expectations across multiple concurrent projects or services.

• Research data and endpoint environments: Working knowledge of research data workflows and endpoint environments, including data acquisition, staging, transfer, storage, sharing, retention, archival, instrument-attached systems, specialized lab devices, legacy systems, workstation management, endpoint protections, lifecycle considerations, and support handoffs.

• Platforms, tools, and security: Experience with data transfer tools and protocols such as Globus, SFTP, rsync, SMB, NFS, or comparable technologies; cloud and enterprise platforms such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Microsoft 365, or comparable services; and information security practices relevant to data and endpoint environments, including access control, least privilege, network segmentation, secure data handling, compensating controls, and regulated-data considerations.

• Service design and operational judgment: Demonstrated ability to develop repeatable service models, standards, templates, documentation, operating procedures, and implementation practices, and to evaluate technical and operational tradeoffs that balance research needs, usability, sustainability, security, compliance, operational capacity, and institutional risk.

• Stakeholder and cross-functional coordination: Demonstrated ability to manage stakeholder relationships, facilitate requirements discovery, resolve competing priorities, lead cross-functional work, communicate recommendations clearly, and translate needs into service requirements, staffing priorities, and implementation plans.

• Communication and documentation: Excellent communication skills, including the ability to explain service direction, requirements, risks, decisions, staffing needs, and outcomes to technical and non-technical audiences, and experience creating or overseeing documentation, diagrams, training materials, procedures, onboarding resources, operational communications, and stakeholder updates.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience managing technical staff in a research university, research computing, core facility, laboratory, academic medical center, or similar environment.

• Experience supporting or managing services for core facilities, instrumentation, laboratory data workflows, or specialized research technology environments.

• Familiarity with regulated or controlled research data environments.

• Experience developing service roadmaps, staffing models, operational metrics, and/or service improvement plans.

• Experience coordinating work across multiple technical teams and stakeholders.

Benefits:

At Northwestern, we are proud to provide meaningful and competitive benefits. The available benefits package for this position will include health, dental, vision, disability, and life insurance; paid vacation and holidays; paid medical/sick and parental leave; tuition benefits for the employee and dependents; pre-tax and flex spending accounts for commuting and dependent care; generous retirement savings options; and wellness programs. For a comprehensive overview of available benefits, including eligibility details, visit us at https://www.northwestern.edu/hr/benefits/index.html to learn more.

Work-Life and Wellness:

Northwestern offers comprehensive programs and services to help you and your family navigate life's challenges and opportunities, and adopt and maintain healthy lifestyles.

We support flexible work arrangements where possible and programs to help you locate and pay for quality, affordable childcare and senior/adult care. Visit us at https://www.northwestern.edu/hr/benefits/work-life/index.html to learn more.

Professional Growth & Development:

Northwestern supports employee career development in all circumstances whether your workspace is on campus or at home. If you're interested in developing your professional potential or continuing your formal education, we offer a variety of tools and resources. Visit us at https://www.northwestern.edu/hr/learning/index.html to learn more.

Northwestern University is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected characteristics, including disability and veteran status. View Northwestern's non-discrimination statement. Job applicants who wish to request an accommodation in the application or hiring process should contact the Office of Civil Rights and Title IX Compliance. View additional information on the accommodations process.