Start date: May 2026
Clearance: NATO Secret
Location: The Hague, Netherlands (full time onsite)

Technical Site Deployment Lead

Job Summary:

The Technical Site Deployment Lead leads transition and activation for deployment of data center nodes across multiple NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCIA) customer sites. These nodes are based on VMware Software-Defined Data Center (SDDC) architectures and will be remotely installed and configured via automation onto existing green field physical infrastructure.

The role oversees and supports site deployments and provides technical leadership during site configuration, transition, activation, and validation of all site capabilities.

The Technical Site Deployment Lead ensures deployments are executed following a documented, repeatable process leveraging automation methodologies, and supports technical validation and transition to operations in coordination with multinational contractor engineering, development, DevOps, cybersecurity, quality assurance (QA), testing, and integrated product support (IPS) teams, as well as relevant NCIA organizations.

The position is required to be onsite five days per week at the customer site in The Hague, Netherlands.

Required Experience, Skills, and Education:
• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Technology, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience).
• 5–8+ years of experience deploying and integrating complex software systems in enterprise or defence environments.
• Must possess and maintain a NATO Secret security clearance.
• Proven experience leading technical deployment or activation efforts in customer-facing environments.
• Experience supporting deployments within NATO or similar multi-national, security-governed environments.
• Strong experience with VMware infrastructure configuration, environment promotion, and production activation.
• Experience working with DevOps pipelines and CI/CD tools (e.g., Terraform, Ansible, Jenkins, GitLab CI) to support controlled release and deployment activities.
• Strong understanding of systems integration, API/interface validation, and configuration management.
• Experience deploying applications into secure or classified environments subject to formal accreditation processes.
• Familiarity with NCIA security accreditation processes and documentation expectations.
• Understanding of NCIA CIS operational acceptance and service transition requirements.
• Hands-on troubleshooting experience in distributed or multi-tier architectures.
• Working knowledge of Agile project management methodologies, tools (e.g., Jira, etc.), and coordination with Scrum teams.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills in high-visibility, multinational stakeholder environments.
· Strong analytical and problem-solving abilities, with a proactive approach to identifying and resolving issues.
· Demonstrated leadership skills, with the ability to inspire and motivate teams.
· Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work collaboratively with cross-functional teams.
· Ability to adapt to changing project requirements and work effectively in a fast-paced environment.
· Ability to travel to various NCIA customer sites as required.

Responsibilities:
· Provide technical leadership of the overall site transition process, organizing and coordinating support from multiple teams and stakeholders.
· Identify entrance and exit criteria and manage technical dependencies, risks, and activation issues; drive resolution and escalate as required.
· Create site transition and activation plans that provide clearly articulated sequence of activities, responsible actors, and schedules for all activities required to activate a site.
· Analyzing site requirements and lead the engineering team to develop the necessary site configuration files and automation playbooks.
· Oversee instantiation and configuration of VMware Infrastructure-as-a-service hosting platforms.
· Oversee instantiation and configuration of associated enterprise workload and services onto the resulting infrastructure-as-a-service nodes.
· Lead Technical Validation and Verification activities during activation, including configuration verification, integration testing, performance checks, and readiness assessments prior to transition to operations.
· Support Security Test and Verification activities in coordination with the contractor Security Accreditation Lead.
· Coordinate with relevant NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCIA) organizations, including Communications and Information Systems (CIS), to support Operational Acceptance and transition to operations.
· Provide clear technical status reporting to programme and technical leadership and NCIA stakeholders during transition and activation activities.
· Ensure deployed configurations are documented, controlled, and aligned with NATO configuration management and baseline requirements.
· Capture lessons learned and continuously improve transition planning, SDDC node deployment practices, and CI/CD pipeline automation.

[5877] Technical Site Deployment Lead