Director of Engineering

Director of Engineering a senior technical leader for Stamford Studios and is responsible for managing the strategic direction and day-to-day oversight of the development and operation of Studios, Post and Digital Operations and all related systems.

Requirements

Responsibilities:

Team Leadership

• Provide strategic leadership and oversight for long-term and short-term planning. Manage the Operational and Facility Technical Budgets for Syndication Studios shows and clients.
• Build/maintain a strong engineering support team of full-time and freelance employees that provide a good mix of managerial support and innovative engineering support.
• Provide regular employee feedback and performance reviews.
• Develop partnerships across NBCU engineering teams with cross-facility support and engagement.
• Work with leadership team from each production that business objectives are being met and that technical deliverables align with business needs.
• Assume leadership responsibility for the technical performance of Studios, Control Rooms, and associated systems for all Stamford Studios facilities.

Television Production Technology Support and Maintenance

• Develop processes to ensure all systems have proper disaster recovery and resiliency and that development practices are aligned with ensuring maximum uptimes for all services and applications.
• Manage the support operational environment, including both remote on-call and onsite technical support teams where necessary. Manage vendor relationships, support contracts and spares.
• Lead the design, development, and ongoing maintenance of all supported technology platforms. Develop conceptual designs and technology architecture vision. Manage on-going projects, including budgets, scheduling, design and integration, system commissioning and training. Maintain system documentation. Engage with system integrators as needed on large scale projects.
• Ensure around-the-clock technical support and maintain complex broadcast production environments consisting of multiple studios, production control rooms and remote locations.
• Monitor and oversee operational readiness of current facilities, maintaining in-depth understanding of all relevant technical systems.
• Lead the coordination of activities of teams involved in the maintenance, support, deployment, and configuration of broadcast equipment.

Facility Technical Upgrades and Strategy

• Collaborate closely with Production Operations senior management and key staff to assess the facility’s ability to provide service based on a dynamic production schedule.
• Collaborate with Stamford Studios leadership and operational clients to develop both short- and long-range strategic technology planning and budgeting.
• Lead corporate driven enterprise initiatives and endeavor to align strategies and develop synergies across all NBCU production locations with Stamford Studios.
• Develop conceptual designs and technology architecture vision, assign project work to team members with clear direction.
• Oversee on-going projects, including budgets, timelines, design and integration, application commissioning and training. Maintain application documentation.

Client Management

• Interface directly with senior client leadership on all projects and act as the engineering leadership client interface, working both formally and informally with operations teams, clients, and executive management.
• Ensure that effective timeline tracking, priority management and scheduling is taking place, and meeting client expectations.
• Guide the engineering team in capturing technical requirements and providing solutions while ensuring resources are available to hit required timelines.

Monitoring and Security

• Collaborate closely with the NBCU cyber security team senior leadership to guide the Production Engineering team in building repeatable systems with security best practices.
• Heavy focus on standard security logging and reporting of all systems.
• Champion the build out of enterprise-wide monitoring systems with automated alerting and dashboarding interfaces for easy troubleshooting

Required Technical Skillsets:

• Post systems design, integration, and support.
• Post-production workflows and operational processes
• Enterprise file storage and virtual computing
• Understanding of IP networking and IP media standards
• Broadcast and IT cabling standards (copper and fiber)
• Understanding of codecs and file formats (SD, HD, 4K, UHD)
• Environments – 2 Studio Production Facilities, 35+ Post-Production Platforms, 3 Graphics Platforms and Network Systems.
  • Avid Interplay, Media Central UX, Media Composer (On-Prem & Cloud)
  • Avid Nexis Storage Platforms (On-Prem & Cloud)
  • Adobe Creative Cloud, BorisFX Sapphire
  • Sony Cameras/Switchers, Evertz & Miranda Routers & Multiviewers, Telex Intercom, Sennheiser/Shure wireless mics, SSL C100/C10 audio consoles, Riedel Wireless Intercom
  • VMWare Virtualized Services at Englewood Cliffs
  • Synology NAS Storage Platforms
  • SGL/FlashNet – Spectra T380 Archive/Restore LTO7 Library
  • Signiant – Media Shuttle
  • Cisco Networking – Routers and Switches

Qualifications / Requirements:

• Strong customer service skills and professionalism
• Close collaboration with both third-party clients and peers across NBCU.
• Strong written and verbal communication, as well as presentation skills for both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Ability to provide clear, decisive direction while being prepared to pivot or change course when appropriate.
• Be the leader that your team is excited to follow, both through regular and planned activities, but also when plans change unexpectedly due to outside influence.
• Demonstrate a high tolerance for stress, work well with others, and provide a supportive attitude for all colleagues.
• Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Engineering, Computer Science, Information Technology, or a relevant field
• Minimum twelve (12) years’ experience preferred in a role demonstrating strong technical, quantitative, and analytical skills.
• Ability to integrate into a large agile development project and manage rapid development cycles.
• 7+ years of management experience, including performance evaluation, hiring and disciplinary action.
• Must be willing to work evenings, weekends, holidays depending on production schedule.