Executive Director, Infrastructure Services

Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is one of the largest school districts in the United States, serving over 320,000 students in 600+ schools and employing approximately 40,000 people, most of them teachers.

CPS has set ambitious goals to ensure that every student, in every school and every neighborhood, has access to a world-class learning experience that prepares each for success in college, career, and civic life.

In order to fulfill this mission, we make three commitments to our students, their families, and all Chicagoans : academic progress, financial stability, and integrity.

Six core values are embedded within these commitments student-centered, whole child, equity, academic excellence, community partnership, and continuous learning.

The Office of Information and Technology Services (ITS) works to build the capacity of schools to use information and technology, maintain network infrastructure, security standards, and support other departments to meet district goals.

ITS provides innovative technology solutions that improve the quality of education for students, reduce the administrative burden on educators, facilitate parent interaction, increase community engagement, and support CPS’ mission of transparency by focusing on the ease and equity of access to information.

Job Summary :

Reporting to the Deputy Chief of Information Technology Services, the Executive Director of Infrastructure Services is responsible for managing and ensuring the effectiveness of the District’s technology infrastructure.

While directly responsible for the Enterprise Server Operations, Network Services, Network Security, Managed Print Services, and the Service Operations Center, the Executive Director of Infrastructure Services also provides leadership for Identity and Access Management and Telecommunications.

The Executive Director of Infrastructure Services supervises a team of over 50 resources, including FTE and consulting staff.

They are also responsible for managing a budget of over $60M, maintaining vendor relationships, and related contractual agreements.

Additionally, this role is responsible for stewardship of the CPS E-Rate program which provides Federal funds for various Infrastructure products and services.

The Executive Director of Infrastructure Services will be held accountable for the following responsibilities :

• Set the strategic direction for the organization's technical infrastructure and security (including hardware, software, servers, storage solutions, networks, telecom systems, and facility automation) in support of critical district business needs.
• Provide strategic leadership in the design, implementation, and maintenance of the organization’s technology infrastructure systems in alignment with the District’s goals.
• Establish IT user support processes, standards, metrics, monitoring, and reporting in order to ensure IT Infrastructure is available, responsive, and achieving business outcomes and objectives.
• Develop an overall roadmap for all infrastructure areas to ensure transparency on the delivery of new services and capabilities and to understand upgrade and replacement needs for existing infrastructure.
• Ensure network uptime, especially during student assessment windows and other key business windows.
• Ensure all critical infrastructure layers (server, storage, network, cybersecurity equipment, and related security software) are all up to the latest recommended patch levels.
• Ensure that all production changes applied to the infrastructure tier adhere to CPS ITS change management standards.
• Ensure timely and enterprise-wide communication in the event of a major infrastructure-related outage.
• Use methods and tools to conduct vulnerability assessments, testing internal and external network perimeters for accessibility.
• Develop, schedule, test, and communicate the IT Disaster Recovery Plan and Procedures in coordination with the Executive Director of Application Services.
• Provide leadership, motivation, coaching, professional development, and day-to-day support to foster an engaged work environment with a focus on customer service.
• Be a consensus builder and persuasive leader with a strong commitment to teamwork and knowledge sharing who effectively communicates technical concepts to a broad range of technical and non-technical staff.
• Assist staff in developing methods and processes to improve efficiency and effectiveness across all infrastructure areas.
• The fulfillment of critical, mission-aligned training opportunities for key enterprise application staff members.
• Implement tangible processes leading to increased retention and succession planning for key positions.
• Recruit, onboard, and coach staff to ensure robust learning and career development consistent with the District’s values and mission.
• Manage infrastructure vendors, service providers, and internal teams to define and achieve key performance indicators and Service Level Agreements with a collaborative spirit in order to continually seek improvements to support the District’s goals.
• Assess and communicate the impacts, trade-offs, risks, costs, benefits, and opportunities of IT solutions.
• Establish formal client engagement framework for the infrastructure practice, ensuring mission alignment, proper prioritization for tasks and generally building customer awareness.
• Collaborate closely with business and technology partners to assure transparency and consistent direction in development priorities.
• Provide project leadership, including work direction and feedback to the sponsors, project leads and teams for high-priority ITS initiatives.
• Negotiate and resolve conflicting change requests and changing priorities across customers / projects; facilitating solutions to complex problems.
• Build high-quality working relationships with executives, technology partners, customers, and all other relevant individuals and groups.
• Oversee, monitor, and report progress on complex and / or multiple infrastructure projects relative to schedules, budgets, and quality.
• Manage the development and delivery of IT standards, best practices, architecture, and systems to ensure information system security across the enterprise.
• Ensure that all locally conceived and / or vendor-based production changes consistently follow a Best Practice release management process and adhere to local standards set forth by the ITS Change Manager.
• Partner with the IT Vendor Management Office and Procurement to ensure that the services and performance of major partners are examined through a quarterly business review;

inclusive of Sentinel, AT&T, Microsoft, and Apple.

• Serve as a final reviewer / editor for all infrastructure-focused vendor contracts.
• Direct responsibility for negotiation of infrastructure-based vendor contracts.
• Hold vendors accountable for general performance and service levels.
• Ensure the ITS infrastructure budget is tightly managed.
• Quality assurance of all infrastructure-related proposals and submissions to the CPS Board of Education.
• Other duties as assigned

In order to be successful and achieve the above responsibilities, the Executive Director of Infrastructure Services must possess the following qualifications :

Education Required :

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field from an accredited college or university
• Relevant professional certifications / designations such as Project Management Professional (PMP), IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), CISCO and Microsoft, preferred

Experience Required :

• Minimum of eight (8) years of professional leadership experience managing multiple infrastructure functions in a large enterprise environment.
• Minimum of eight (8) years of experience in a managerial role with responsibility for leading, training, and mentoring a team of direct reports.
• Minimum of fifteen (15) years of the above experience strongly preferred
• Infrastructure and operations experience at an institution of K-12 education.
• Experience overseeing federally funded initiatives, such as the E-Rate program; ensuring that all application and reporting deadlines are met.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities :

• In-depth knowledge of IT management and a thorough understanding of IT in K-12 education with the ability to understand, communicate, and advise on the potential outcome of critical decisions.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to facilitate presentations to technical and non-technical audiences
• Strong technical background, as well as an ability to work across all district departments to align priorities and plans with key business objectives.
• High levels of IT expertise, integrity, honesty, credibility, and the courage to make difficult yet necessary decisions
• Ability to work in collaboration with the ITS leadership team to understand and adhere to CPS ITS strategies, standards, and policies
• Ability to develop deep knowledge of the District’s business units and functions, building both horizontal and vertical relationships with business departments and IT leaders that deliver business impact.
• Expertise in leadership development; ability to coach directors and managers toward excellence and build the capacity of technical teams
• Ability to contribute to the people priorities and objectives regarding people leader effectiveness, employee engagement, and enabling others to perform.
• Ability to articulate a vision, set high standards, and effectively guide teams and stakeholders in the realization of expectations set
• Effective strategic planning capabilities, including the ability to establish long-term vision and goals, and align / manage activities toward goal fulfillment
• Knowledge of operations, budget / finance, management and organizational development
• Ability to build collaborative relationships with a variety of constituent groups, including external partners, to ensure the entire system operates in the most effective manner possible to support organizational success
• Ability to define problems, analyze data, and outline valid conclusions and action steps
• Capable of following Company policies and practices while representing CPS in an ethical and professional manner in all interactions with employees, governmental agencies, vendors, contractors, suppliers, students, and the Chicago community
• Expert level knowledge of IT infrastructure technologies, solutions, and strategies, including both traditional and cloud based infrastructure.
• Proven ability to provide supervisory guidance for troubleshooting and / or debugging issues with servers, storage arrays, local and wide area networks, remote device management, and perimeter security.
• Strong knowledge of disaster recovery and business continuity concepts and strategies.
• Familiarity with the principles of project management, including but not limited to experience with both Waterfall and AGILE project management methodologies.
• Familiarity with the detailed practices of the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL).
• Familiarity with information security standards (e.g., NIST, ISO, OWASP, etc.), rules and regulations related to information security and confidentiality (e.

g., PCI, HIPAA, FERPA, GLBA, 508 etc.) and other various security standards and policies.

• Ability to deliver in a fast-paced environment, respond immediately to multiple constituencies and meet established deadlines
• A dynamic leader with excellent interpersonal and analytical skills, who values, and excels at, collaboration, identifying opportunities, creative problem solving, and customer service.
• In-depth knowledge of, and familiarity with, IT products and services.
• A commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion and to serving the needs of a diverse School-district community.
• Exceptional organizational, problem-solving, and project management skills.
• Proactive, decisive, action-oriented individual with a strong attention to detail.
• Ability to work on multiple complex projects simultaneously.

Conditions of Employment

As a condition of employment with the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), employees are required to :

Establish / Maintain Chicago Residency - Employees are required to live within the geographic boundaries of the City of Chicago within six months of their CPS hire date and maintain residency throughout their employment with the district.

The Chicago residency requirement does not apply to temporary / part-time positions, however, all CPS employees must be residents of Illinois.

Be Fully Vaccinated Against COVID-19 - Unless approved for a medical or religious exemption, all employees are required to be up-to-date on COVID-19 vaccinations, including boosters, and to submit proof of vaccination to the district within 30 days of hire.

Up-to-date on vaccination is defined as being at least two weeks past all primary vaccine doses and any applicable boosters.