IT Operations Manager - Infrastructure & Operations

Where passion meets opportunity

The best of your adventures is the one you have yet to sail!

Your Purpose

Explora Journeys is a vibrant, cosmopolitan, European luxury brand, imagined in the heart of Swiss hospitality in Geneva. Leveraging our parent company MSC Group’s hundreds of years of maritime expertise, our fleet of six luxury ships (four currently in the pipeline) are being built and designed in a totally different and unique way that will transform and redefine the cruise experience, creating a category of its own, appealing to the next generation of luxury travellers. 

The IT Operations Manager – Infrastructure & Operations will be responsible for managing daily IT operations and coordinating IT infrastructure projects delivery, ensuring stability, scalability, security and high availability of all core IT services. He will own the transition of changes into production, including release governance, deployment coordination and operational monitoring.
Headquarters in Geneva.

Your Impact

Infrastructure & Operations Management
- Oversees global IT operations, guaranteeing availability, performance and resilience of core platforms (network, servers, storage, databases, hybrid cloud, collaboration tools, end user computing).
- Ensures consistent and standardized IT operations, including support models, procedures and incident handling
- Owns and evolves the monitoring and observability ecosystem through a comprehensive mapping of the services and components, adding a strong focus on E2E transactions
- Oversees AOM (Application Operations Management) and Asset Management processes, ensuring proper lifecycle control, configuration and documentation.
- Ensures effective change, incident, problem and service management processes.

Team & Vendor Leadership
- Leads, mentors and develops a multi-disciplinary IT Operations team, fostering a high-performance and service-oriented culture across the DevSecOps spectrum.
- Coordinates Service Desk / End-User Computing activities and their escalation to Operations
- Manages third-party vendors and service providers, service design, SLA definition and performance monitoring.
- Builds strong relationships with onboard and remote IT relays, technology partners and managed service providers, ensuring alignment with strategic and operational goals.

Project & Transformation Delivery
- Manages infrastructure and operations programs (cloud infrastructure lifecycle, network upgrades, monitoring platforms, SaaS ecosystem evolutions).
- Ensures that infrastructure and operations requirements are properly embedded in cross-functional projects and digital initiatives.
- Validates architecture and technical designs to ensure they meet operational, security and compliance standards.
- Coordinates release operations with technical and business stakeholders through robust risk control and strong execution orchestration, while minimizing disruption to the operations
- Promotes automation, standardization and simplification to increase efficiency and reduce operational risk.

Risk, Security & Compliance
- Works closely with Cyber Security and Compliance teams to ensure the protection of IT assets and data, and adherence to regulatory and internal policies.
- Oversees disaster recovery, business continuity and resilience planning for critical IT services across shore and shipboard environments.
- Identifies and manages operational risks, implementing mitigation plans and continuous improvement actions.

Your Journey so far

- Significant experience (10+ years) in IT, including several years in management roles within Infrastructure & Operations.
- A minimum of 3 years of experience in the cruise, maritime, hospitality, retail or similar 24/7 mission-critical operational environment is a strong advantage.

Your Essentials

- Proven track record managing large-scale IT infrastructures (on-premises and cloud), networks, data centers and distributed IT operations.
- Strong experience with ITIL processes, COBIT or equivalent IT governance frameworks.
- Hands-on familiarity with advanced monitoring and observability platforms.
- Experience with AOM, Asset Management and structured SLA/OLA management.
- Demonstrated success in leading and developing teams, including remote and geographically distributed teams.
- Experience in vendor and contract management: RFPs, negotiations, SLA design, performance reviews.
- Strong understanding of logistically challenging operations is a plus (connectivity constraints, safety, regulatory requirements, operational continuity).
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, able to interact effectively with executive management and non-technical stakeholders.
- Fluent in English, both spoken and written; additional languages are an advantage.
- Degree in Computer Science, Engineering or related field; advanced certifications in ITIL, COBIT, cloud, or project/program management are a plus.

Key Technologies

Cloud infrastructure: AWS, Azure, GCP, OCI
Server OS : Linux (AL, Ubuntu, Debian), Windows Server 2022
Containerization: Docker, Kubernetes (k3s, RKE, EKS, AKS)
Code: Github, Bitbucket
Orchestration & automation: Ansible, Terraform, Rundeck
Monitoring: Dynatrace, NewRelic, Grafana, Sentry, PagerDuty
Advanced networking: Vnets, routing, firewalling, SDWan, IPSEC, SSLVPN
End-User computing: M365, Intune, Kandji
Identity: Okta, Entra, Active Directory
Work Management: Atlassian

Our commitment

We are committed to building a future that values diverse perspectives, embraces the world beyond borders, and fosters an inclusive environment where every individual feels valued, respected and empowered to be their authentic selves. Our commitment extends to taking meaningful, measurable actions that have a long-term positive impact on our guests, our employees and our planet.

Ready to turn your passion into something extraordinary? Join us at MSC Cruises, where new opportunities await. Apply today to be part of a global team that is pushing boundaries and achieving something remarkable. Your journey starts here!