Freelance Operational Technology Engineer Jobs in Greer, SC

Director, Operational Technology (OT) Engineering

NorthMark Compute & Cloud (NMC²)is backed by dedicated leadership and investment, with a clear mission as it operates at the bleeding edge of technology. Its goal is to scale and enhance the high-performance computing (HPC) and cloud infrastructure that supports its clients' research, production, and delivery, enabling breakthroughs that shape the industries of tomorrow. Its engineers build critical infrastructure to eliminate friction in scientific research, simulations, analysis, and decision-making, accelerating discovery and driving faster innovation.

The Position

We are seeking a Director of OT Engineering in Spartanburg County, SC to provide strategic and hands-on technical leadership across the full OT infrastructure stack. This is a critical leadership role for a versatile senior engineer with deep cross-domain expertise spanning Windows Active Directory, identity and access management, security appliances, virtualization platforms, and enterprise storage, all within the unique constraints of OT/ICS environments. You will lead the engineering team responsible for the platforms, systems, and services underpinning OT operations, working in close partnership with the Director of OT Cybersecurity.

Responsibilities:

• Define and execute the OT engineering strategy and multi-year infrastructure roadmap, aligning technology investments with operational and security objectives.
• Provide senior technical leadership and people management to a team of OT infrastructure, endpoint, and systems engineers.
• Own the enterprise Active Directory and hybrid Azure AD / Entra ID architecture for OT environments, governing identity lifecycle, Group Policy, privileged access, and directory services integration.
• Lead IAM strategy for OT environments including RBAC, MFA, PAM, and service account governance.
• Oversee design, deployment, and management of security appliances within OT infrastructure: NGFWs, NAC, IPS, and web application firewalls.
• Direct the organisation's OT virtualisation platforms including VMware vSphere/ESXi, Proxmox VE, and Kubernetes.
• Own the enterprise storage strategy for OT environments: SAN, NAS, object storage, and backup architectures.
• Ensure all engineering platforms comply with IEC 62443, NIST SP 800-82, CIS Benchmarks, and organizational security policies.
• Lead infrastructure disaster recovery and business continuity planning, testing, and execution for OT systems.
• Collaborate with the Director of OT Cybersecurity to integrate engineering infrastructure into the broader OT security architecture.
• Manage vendor relationships, licensing, support contracts, and procurement.
• Establish and enforce change management, configuration management, and documentation standards.
• Drive team capability development through structured training, mentoring, and certification programs.
• Produce executive-level reporting on infrastructure health, capacity, risk, and programme status.
• Lead cross-functional engineering projects involving OT network, cybersecurity, endpoint, and operational teams.

Requirements:

• 15+ years infrastructure engineering; 8+ years in OT, ICS, or critical infrastructure in a senior or leadership capacity.
• Expert-level Active Directory design, administration, and governance in OT environments.
• Deep experience with hybrid identity architectures: Azure AD / Entra ID, Conditional Access, Entra Connect, Privileged Identity Management.
• Demonstrated expertise designing security appliances in OT: NGFWs (FortiGate, Palo Alto), NAC, IPS.
• Expert-level VMware vSphere/ESXi and/or Proxmox VE including clustering, HA, and performance tuning.
• Strong knowledge of enterprise storage: SAN, NAS, Ceph, and backup/replication solutions.
• Experience managing Kubernetes in production OT or enterprise contexts.
• Understanding of OT/ICS network architecture, industrial protocols, and engineering constraints.
• Proven ability to lead, develop, and retain high-performing engineering teams.
• Familiarity with IEC 62443, NIST SP 800-82, and CIS Benchmarks.
• Certifications preferred: MCSE/modern Microsoft, VCP, CKA, CISSP, or equivalent.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, IT, Electrical Engineering, or related field.
• Experience with PAM platforms such as CyberArk, BeyondTrust, or FortiPAM in OT environments (preferred)
• Familiarity with OpenStack or other private cloud platforms in OT contexts (preferred)
• Hands-on experience with observability stacks (Prometheus, Grafana, Elastic) (preferred)
• Director-level budget ownership and vendor negotiation experience (preferred)
• Experience within NERC CIP or IEC 62443 regulated environments (preferred)