Director of Information Technology

Fluidra’s seeking a Director of Information Technology to join the IT team. We are open to this person being based out of either of our North America offices, Carlsbad, CA or Atlanta, GA.

WHAT YOU WILL CONTRIBUTE 

The role is accountable for leading the regional IT organization in the development of strategies, scoping of investments, implementation of strategic projects and execution of local support to fulfill the needs of the regional Fluidra business segment. This leadership position is expected to challenge the status quo, identify strategic opportunities to apply digital ways of working as well as technology and advise business leaders on organization changes required to achieve value. This position is accountable for the overall quality of IT customer service to the regional business segment, with internal direct reports in the region of responsibility located at both headquarters and manufacturing locations. 

The role represents the IT function in regional business activities. This position is the technology advisor for the delivery of successful project outcomes, minimizing mission critical system downtime, enabling the regional team to meet their commitments enabled by technology and complying with global standards and regulations. This role is the leader accountable to fulfill regional needs while operating within company-wide standards, practices and policies. 

As a member of the Global IT and Business leadership teams, this role needs to set the appropriate tone at the top. The position requires a leader who leads by example, is competent, confident, perseverant, inspirational, influencing, disciplined, pragmatic and dependable. In addition, this individual needs to be highly collaborative, a strong communicator and continuous improvement minded. The ability to deliver tactical projects while anticipating issues and thinking strategically is required. 

The position requires a demonstrated ability to manage a diverse portfolio of requests, quickly mediate between competing priorities, and work effectively with IT colleagues, contractors, and business management both within and across reporting relationships, business units and geographic regions. 

Finally, this leadership role is responsible for the management, development and engagement of its people, including the hiring of staff, their instruction, coaching and evaluation. The role is held accountable to optimize the mix of internal talent, purchased services and tools to enable business results at lowest delivered cost. Additionally, you will: 

Business Relationship Management: 

• Business Relationships - Develop working relationships with a diverse group of business people and gain an understanding of the complex nature of the company’s business. Maintain familiarity with the business plans of the company and the departments serviced.  
• Business Alignment - Meets with user management and staff to understand business requirements and to determine system requirements for all functions in the area of responsibility. Works with customers to define and prioritize improvement initiatives. Assists in building strategic roadmaps and aligning the business initiatives with IT initiatives to shape the IT vision and strategy. Ensures participation of IT in business partner weekly operations, quarterly strategic reviews or annual planning sessions.  
• Business Case Development - Responsible for contributing to business case generation and overall project strategies including project plans for major efforts that satisfy the business needs of that functional area for review and approval by management. Also responsible for assisting user management in setting priorities.  
• Demand Management – Identify key strategic business and functional requirements for the areas of responsibility. Responsible for assisting users in setting priorities, resolving competing initiatives and aligning expectations throughout the portfolio.  
• Issue Escalation – Key role in the management, impact analysis and communication of system performance or production downtime events. Acts as conduit between IT applications support and business leadership.  

Program Leadership: 

• Program Structure & Governance – Works with the PMO team to properly structure projects for success. Qualifies functional resources as well as business SMEs and leads for participation in the project. Accountable for functional design, user training, change management and launch support for all projects. Together with the PMO selects delivery partners and constructs preferred commercial agreements with external providers. Develops methods for tracking and reporting status of IT programs to business partners.  
• Resource Management - Directs, instructs, and coaches staff in order to meet project goals according to the agreed upon scope, schedule and budget. Allocates and balances work assignments to best meet needs of the portfolio. Evaluates and reports the performance of assigned team members.  
• Collaboration - Works closely with IT management peers to ensure customer needs are being addressed, solutions are complete and not compromised because of functional boundaries and/or the capabilities of the technical architecture.  
• Drive Standards - Oversees and ensures the quality of testing, application documentation, user training, change management, production release and on-going support.  
• Issue Management – Key role in the escalation and resolution of issues during project delivery by working across IT functions, department boundaries and the business community.  
• Delivery Partners – Selects, qualifies and manages internal and external delivery partners to ensure successful, high quality outcomes, on-time and on-budget. Builds relationships with delivery leaders to effectively overcome barriers to success.  

Service Operations Management: 

• Regional Customer Service – Provide direction and staffing for support of all incidents and service requests that cannot be satisfied by global service desk, AMS or infrastructure support. Respond to all escalations for service help in the region. Measure customer satisfaction and take actions to improve results and perception of the department in the region. Provide VIP support.  
• Plant Support – Manage local IT support to manufacturing, distribution and HQ locations within the region. Provide local application support (L0) across plant, enterprise and desktop applications. Direct changes that require local hands and feet to execute including plant server, monitor, network, printer and handheld device updates/refreshes.  
• Major Incident Management – Engage in all major incidents that occur in the region through restoration of service. Act as a communication liaison between IT and customers. Provide 8D champion to ensure RCA and PCA’s are identified to regional leadership acceptance levels.  
• PC Lifecycle Mgmt – Establish regional management of PC refresh activities, idle inventory management and PC break/fix.  

Team Management: 

• Staff Management - Responsible for the professional development of staff. Responsible for hiring of staff personnel in area of responsibility. Conducts interviews, individual performance and development planning performance reviews, other supervisory interactions and proposes salary increases.  

Local Employee Engagement: 

• Action Planning – Leads creation of annual EE plan activities. Champions ideas, funding and drives inclusion in the region.  
• Communication – Organizes and leads recurring town hall meetings for all IT employees physically located in the region regardless of reporting structure.  
• Local Liaison – Cascades and directs compliance to any local HR information relative to policy, facilities, training or other to IT employees located in the region.  

Departmental: 

• Financial Responsibilities - Participates in creating of department budget and quarterly forecasts. Responsible for consulting, salary, travel and training budgets in designated areas of responsibility.  
• Operating Model – Provides feedback and helps shape the operating model of the department to achieve balance between governance, speed, risk and quality required by the region.  

WHAT WE SEEK

• 15+ years’ experience defining, implementing and supporting Information Technology systems with an emphasis on manufacturing processes and continuous operations.  
• 10+ years leadership experience managing technical delivery teams and owning a project portfolio.  
• Experience with Vendor Management for both product and service vendors 
• Experience using structured project management methodologies with agile SDLC methods.  
• Experience leading individual programs greater than $5M in size.  
• Experience with aftermarket autoparts global sales channels a significant plus.  
• Action oriented, with the ability to understand and willingness to get into systems development details when warranted. “Do what it takes” attitude.  
• Experience with managing in house and contract staff; experience with off-shore development is preferred.  
• Experience supporting applications in a 24x7x365 manufacturing environment.  
• Strong analytical skills with demonstrated ability to convert business needs into system requirements.  
• Excellent oral and written communication skills 
• Multi-lingual capabilities preferred 
• Demonstrated IT leadership skills with a proven track record of success 
• Willingness to travel internationally to support job responsibilities as required (Approx. 20%).
   

EDUCATION

• BS Degree in Information Technology or similar field. MS Degree or MBA preferred.  

An exciting opportunity to dive in and begin your career with a company that offers a competitive total rewards package that includes: 

• 9/80 work week schedule (EVERY OTHER FRIDAY OFF!)
• Paid vacation
• 11 paid Holidays
• Full range of health benefits including medical, dental & vision, short & long-term disability
• 401(K) matching (100% of first 3% contributed, 50% of the next 2%)
• Health and wellness programs / gym reimbursement
• Educational assistance up to $7,000 per year
• On-site self-service café / free gourmet coffee stations
• Company sponsored FUN events!
• On-site gym, ping-pong, foosball, outdoor bocce ball court, BBQ & firepit
• Generous product discounts

WHO WE ARE

Fluidra is a publicly listed company focused on developing innovative products, services and IoT solutions for the residential, commercial and wellness pool markets, globally. The company operates in over 45 countries, has over 7,000 employees and owns a portfolio of some of the industry’s most recognized and trusted brands: Polaris®, Jandy®, CMP, S.R. Smith, and Zodiac®. We also sell products under the Cover‐Pools®, iAquaLink®, Grand Effects® , Dell® and Nature2® names. With these combined resources we’re able accelerate innovation in critical areas like energy-efficiency, robotics and the Internet of Things.

Our focus is on creating the perfect pool and wellness experience responsibly. We take our mission to heart, and our employees embody these guiding principles in everything we do: passion for success, honesty & trust, customer collaboration, teamwork and inclusion, learn and adapt, excellence and innovation.

Don't meet every single requirement listed? At Fluidra, we thrive on building an inclusive workspace, so if you are excited about this role and your past experience doesn't align perfectly, we encourage you to apply anyways! You may be just the right candidate for this role or another role in the organization. Fluidra is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. Fluidra recruits, employs, trains, compensates and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, disability, age, veteran status, or any legally protected characteristic.

Expected salary range is $180,000 - $230,000. Fluidra offers a comprehensive total rewards / benefits program that includes base salary, annual bonus based on performance of individual and company objectives, competitive 401K matching, paid vacation and sick time, full range of health benefits, educational assistance, etc. The actual salary offer will carefully consider a wide range of factors, including skills, qualifications, experience and location. Your recruiter will provide additional details on our compensation and total rewards program.