It Infrastructure Operations Manager Jobs in Arizona

Be the one who makes a difference!

At Vertex Education we are a team of high achievers, courageous leaders, and passionate believers in changing lives through education. As a purpose-led education services provider, our mission is destined to benefit many and yet it starts with just one person inspired to work together with us to make a memorable and meaningful difference for our clients, schools, students, and communities. Be the one who makes a difference-with us.

As the Manager of IT Service Delivery for Vertex Support Services, you will directly advance our mission of changing lives through education by serving as the ultimate technical backbone and trusted partner for our external client schools. Operating as a highly capable department of one (to start), you will anchor our IT operations by balancing deep, hands-on incident resolution with highly customized, empathetic support tailored to the unique culture of each educational environment. You will act as the final escalation point for critical infrastructure outages-personally navigating complex systems like Cisco Meraki and Microsoft Entra ID while simultaneously directing contracted labor-and concurrently designing long-term architectural roadmaps. Success in this role requires a hyper-productive technical expert who rejects rigid, impersonal policies in favor of high-touch communication, actively pilots innovative technologies, and ultimately ensures every school leader feels supported, heard, and technically empowered.

Responsibilities / Essential Functions:

1. Hands-On Technical Escalation & Incident Management:

• Serve as the final technical escalation point for critical infrastructure outages, directly diagnosing and resolving complex server, network, and identity access issues.

• Provide immediate, hands-on troubleshooting during severe technology failures to rapidly restore essential school services across client environments.

• Monitor network health proactively using tools like Connectwise and PRTG Network Monitor to identify and address physical and virtual infrastructure warnings.

• Manage complex configurations within Cisco Meraki, Ubiquiti UniFi, and Dell PowerEdge server environments during daily operations and emergency events.

2. Client Engagement & Bespoke Service Delivery:

• Communicate directly with external school principals and staff during technical disruptions to provide empathetic, reassuring updates and preserve client trust.

• Regularly meet with clients to address issues proactively

• Translate complex technical problems and root cause analyses into clear, non-technical language for external school stakeholders during post-incident reviews.

• Gather qualitative feedback from school leadership through continuous high-touch engagement to adapt and refine daily IT support procedures.

3. IT Architecture & Systems Engineering:

• Document long-term IT infrastructure roadmaps and identity management deployment models for client schools utilizing IT Glue and SharePoint.

• Evaluate and run simulated or live pilots of emerging technologies, such as AI-driven support bots, within willing client environments to test operational viability.

• Administer and structure Identity and Access Management (IAM) platforms, including Microsoft Entra ID, Google Workspace Admin, and Okta, tailored to specific school needs.

• Analyze current external client infrastructure configurations to outline transition plans that shift reactive break-fix environments into proactive, engineered networks.

4. Vendor Management & Operational Execution:

• Triage, manage, and personally resolve daily helpdesk tickets within Hubspot, actively balancing the immediate elimination of ticket backlogs with long-term design responsibilities.

• Direct and coordinate the daily activities of contracted third-party labor to handle physical on-site infrastructure requests and bridge operational capacity gaps.

• Execute concurrent technical resolutions by managing remote troubleshooting sessions while simultaneously dispatching and instructing on-site vendor technicians.

• Draft structural blueprints and operational plans to design the future organizational chart for the Vertex Support Services IT department.

Qualifications:

Required Qualifications:

• 5+ years of experience in IT service delivery, systems administration, or network engineering, acting as the definitive technical escalation point for critical infrastructure outages.

• Demonstrated ability to deliver highly empathetic, bespoke IT support to external clients, ensuring non-technical leaders feel heard and supported during disruptions.

• Deep hands-on expertise managing and troubleshooting network infrastructure and hardware, specifically Cisco Meraki, Ubiquiti UniFi, and Dell PowerEdge servers.

• Strong proficiency configuring and managing Identity and Access Management (IAM) deployments, including Microsoft Entra ID, Google Workspace Admin, and Okta.

• Experience leveraging ITSM and Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) platforms, such as HubSpot and Connectwise, to triage and resolve daily ticket backlogs.

• Proven track record of directing third-party contractors to execute on-site physical infrastructure tasks while concurrently managing remote technical resolutions.

• Experience drafting standard operating procedures (SOPs), custom service catalogs, and comprehensive long-term architecture documentation from scratch in platforms like IT Glue or SharePoint.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Prior experience working in an IT managed service provider (MSP) environment or directly supporting external K-12 educational institutions.

• Relevant professional certifications in networking (e.g., CCNA, Meraki CMNA) or identity and cloud management (e.g., Microsoft Certified: Identity and Access Administrator).

• Experience designing departmental blueprints or preparing structural plans to prepare for future team expansion beyond a solo contributor model.

Be excited to be a part of our team and grow your career with us!

Be the one who enables us to positively impact over 258,000 students across multiple states while driving our growth forward so we can enrich even more lives. Be the one who helps us achieve excellence for over 226 schools that we support with academics, finance, technology, human resources, communications, marketing, facilities, construction, and food services. Be the one who is a diverse thinker, a team player, a smart risk taker, an innovator, and a difference maker by encouraging others to climb higher and reach farther to further education.

• Be yourself surrounded by wonderful people who care about you, value your unique skills, and lift you up.

• Be supported in your work by caring leaders and team members who want you to succeed.

• Be empowered to make a difference and climb higher and reach farther to change lives through education.

• Be well in all aspects of your life from your physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing to your finances.

• Enjoy industry-leading pay, rewards, referral bonuses, with unlimited flexible paid time-off for performance.

• Be able to care for your health and your family with comprehensive medical, dental and vision benefits and invest in your future with 401(k) plans with a 6% employer match on your contributions.

• Enhance your growth and development with mentoring and money to take training classes.

• Thrive in a welcoming, supportive, and inclusive environment where we treat others with fairness and respect, celebrate diversity, and elevate equality and inclusion as an equal opportunity employer.

Be the one who makes a difference!

With an innovative mind, a hungry heart, and engaging spirit you can change lives through education. Be a part of Vertex Education and let's make a difference together. Apply Today!