Regional Director of Engineering

Cushman & Wakefield•New York, NY

About The Position

The IFM Engineering Director – Center of Excellence (CoE) is a senior technical leader responsible for establishing and governing engineering excellence across a complex, highly regulated financial services portfolio of ~8.0 million sq. ft., 80 sites across North America. This role ensures the reliability, resilience, compliance, and performance of mission-critical environments including trading floors, corporate headquarters (which includes a data center), and office space. The Director will build and lead an Engineering CoE that drives standardization, process improvement, risk mitigation, operational continuity, digital innovation, and asset lifecycle optimization aligned with the stringent uptime, regulatory, and security requirements of financial institutions and our banking client.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical, Electrical, or related Engineering discipline (required).
10+ years of engineering leadership experience within mission-critical or highly regulated environments.
Proven experience supporting financial institutions, data centers, or critical infrastructure portfolios.
5+ years in senior leadership roles.
Demonstrated success building and governing Centers of Excellence.
Strong understanding of risk management frameworks within financial services environments.
Mission-critical systems expertise
Operational resilience & risk mitigation
Regulatory compliance & audit governance
Asset lifecycle & capital planning
Executive communication & stakeholder management
Digital transformation in critical environments
Business continuity planning
Executive level communications and presence

Nice To Haves

Master’s degree preferred.
Professional Engineer (PE) license preferred.

Responsibilities

Establish and lead a Banking-focused Engineering Center of Excellence supporting enterprise IFM delivery
Define engineering governance, technical standards, and risk frameworks across all facilities.
Align engineering strategy with business continuity and processes, operational resilience, regulatory compliance objectives and client maintenance standards & practices.
Partner with stakeholders (Real Estate, Risk, Technology, Compliance) to ensure infrastructure stability and performance.
Oversee standards & practices for critical systems including UPS, generators, switchgear, HVAC, BMS, fire/life safety, and cooling.
Drive reliability-centered maintenance (RCM) and predictive analytics programs for mission-critical assets.
Lead root cause analysis (RCA) for significant outages or infrastructure events.
Ensure robust disaster recovery and business continuity of engineering support.
Parter with Compliance team to ensure high audit results on all Operational Assessments
Ensure compliance with financial regulatory standards, building codes, and internal risk frameworks.
Support audit readiness (internal, client and regulatory) and documentation aligned with enterprise risk management processes.
Develop engineering controls that mitigate operational and systemic risks.
Partner with site-level facility and engineering teams in support of internal operational assessments and improvements.
Ensure all contract KPIs across regions are met / exceeded: uptime, response time, and maintenance compliance, including fiscal implications which may include developing change requests.
Implement asset lifecycle planning and long-term capital forecasting.
Drive benchmarking and performance analytics across corporate offices, trading floors, and data centers
Oversight of Preventative Maintenance program in alignment with strict adherence to client’s Operations & Maintenance standards
Provide guidance and expertise on infrastructure and expansion projects
Lead CMMS optimization, IoT deployment, and real-time asset monitoring strategies.
Advance smart building technologies that enhance resilience and operational transparency.
Integrate digital dashboards for executive visibility into portfolio performance.
Champion automation and AI-driven predictive maintenance tools.
Align engineering standards with enterprise sustainability & net zero commitments
Implement energy efficiency programs across data centers and office portfolios.
Support green building certifications and sustainable infrastructure initiatives.
Balance sustainability objectives with mission-critical reliability requirements.
Build and lead a high-performing engineering CoE team of 4 – 6 FTEs that support an facility & operating engineering team of 200+
Develop competency frameworks, skills assessment, resources needs & proper gearing specific to client’s assets we serve.
Establish technical training programs focused on mission-critical systems and compliance.
Promote a culture of safety, accountability, and continuous improvement.
Serve as the senior technical advisor to client and executive leadership.
Present engineering risk assessments, resilience roadmaps, and capital strategies.
Support contract negotiations, technical solution design, and enterprise transformations.
Lead executive-level incident reporting and post-event analysis when required.