Design Manager, NA

Design Manager, NA

Vantage Data Centers powers, cools, protects and connects the technology of the world’s well-known hyperscalers, cloud providers and large enterprises. Developing and operating across North America, EMEA and Asia Pacific, Vantage has evolved data center design in innovative ways to deliver dramatic gains in reliability, efficiency and sustainability in flexible environments that can scale as quickly as the market demands.

The Design Integration Group (DIG) at Vantage is responsible for the stewardship and execution of the data center design through the project lifecycle, from early development through construction and handover to operations. It includes Design Management, Design Engineering and Regional Product teams, and collaborates closely with Regional Product, Design Engineering, New Site Development, Construction, and Operations teams.

Possible locations:
Denver, CO;
Phoenix, AZ;
Santa Clara, CA;
Ashburn, VA. Flexible work policy: 3 days onsite, 2 days flexible. The Design Manager champions design quality, value engineering, risk mitigation, commissioning readiness, and seamless handoff to construction and operations while upholding hyperscaler customer expectations for uptime, resiliency, speed to delivery, and total cost of ownership (TCO). The role serves as the central link between New Site Development, Product, Engineering, and Construction teams, driving the design process from early concept through project handover.

• Act as the connective hub coordinating all design-related communication, milestones, and deliverables across Development, Engineering, Construction, and Operations.
• Drive product standardization efforts in collaboration with the Product and Engineering teams, ensuring design solutions are optimized and scalable.
• Represent Design Management in project governance, risk reviews, and executive updates, providing data-backed insight into performance and decision-making.
• Collaborate with Construction, Procurement, Telecom, Power, Security, Controls, Commissioning, and Operations teams.
• Manage RFI resolution, design clarifications, change controls, drawing revisions, and design risk escalations.

• Lead concept → schematic → design development → IFC (Issued for Construction) design phases for hyperscale campuses (50–500+ MW portfolios).
• Lead external architect and consultant teams, ensuring clear scope definition, performance management, and integration into internal workflows.
• Oversee design milestone delivery, reporting progress against defined KPIs including cost per MW, design cycle time, and change volume.
• Coordinate regional design feedback loops to improve the next generation of product and design standards.
• Manage design consultants, AE firms, specialty vendors, and technical stakeholders to deliver full drawings, specifications, calculations, BIM models, and design basis documentation.
• Maintain alignment with hyperscaler design standards, reference architectures, resiliency tiers, redundancy philosophies, and security frameworks.
• Drive modular design, repeatability, standardization, and prefabrication strategies for speed of deployment.

• Identify value engineering opportunities that reduce cost, schedule, and complexity without compromising resilience.
• Drive TCO metrics including PUE, WUE, power density optimization and redundancy tradeoffs.
• Lead design risk assessments, mitigation planning, and QA/QC audits.
• Support sequencing, schedule planning, and cost modeling for multi-wave campus builds.

• Own the development and reporting of design-related metrics and dashboards.
• Lead lessons learned and change management processes to capture insights and strengthen future project predictability.
• Partner with data governance and project controls to ensure data accuracy, consistency, and traceability across the portfolio.
• Implement and evolve PM tools (e.g., Click Up) to drive visibility, efficiency, and accountability across teams.

• Promote…