Associate Director/Director, IT Infrastructure

Why Work With Us? 

At Candel, our people drive our success. We value diversity, collaboration, and bold thinking in a supportive, mission-driven environment. We are a high performing team; we show up for each other and stay focused on making a difference for patients and families. Our leadership is transparent and empowering, and our culture is built on trust, flexibility, and accountability, encouraging ownership and innovation every day. 

Our Science: Advancing Cancer Immunotherapies 

Candel is a clinical-stage biopharma company developing off-the-shelf, multimodal immunotherapies that stimulate personalized, systemic anti-tumor responses. Our platforms use genetically modified adenovirus and HSV constructs. With positive Phase 3 results for our lead candidate, it’s an exciting time to join us and help bring transformative cancer treatments to patients. Learn more: www.candeltx.com 

Position Summary 
The Director of IT Infrastructure & Operations is both a strategic leader and a hands-on technical expert responsible for ensuring the reliability, scalability, and security of the company’s IT environment. This role oversees infrastructure architecture, systems administration, integrations, and end-user support to meet business needs, including regulatory requirements. The ideal candidate balances tactical execution with visionary planning, driving efficiency, and continuous improvement in a collaborative, fast-paced biotech environment.  
This is a hybrid role.

Key Responsibilities 

Strategic Leadership 

• Develop and execute an enterprise infrastructure roadmap aligned with business functional roadmaps, risk management, and compliance priorities. 

• Partner with senior leadership to plan IT budgets, assess capacity, and prioritize technology investments. 

• Identify opportunities for innovation, automation, and cloud optimization to enhance system performance and reliability. 

• Establish IT technical standards, metrics, and processes to ensure transparency and accountability. 

Operational Oversight 

• Lead the design, implementation, and ongoing management of secure, redundant network and server infrastructure. 

• Oversee all internal and external IT operations, including managed service providers, to ensure service continuity and user satisfaction. 

• Implement performance monitoring, incident response, and disaster recovery strategies to minimize downtime and data loss. 

• Maintain strong vendor partnerships and manage contracts for hardware, software, and service providers. 

People & Process Management 

• Foster a culture of accountability, learning, and proactive problem-solving. 

• Partner cross-functionally with departments to understand business requirements and translate them into reliable technology solutions. 

• Define and refine support workflows, escalation procedures, and SLAs for service delivery. 

Compliance & Quality Systems 

• Ensure IT infrastructure meets FDA 21 CFR Part 11, SOX, and GxP regulatory standards. 

• Support validated systems used in laboratory and on-prem environments by ensuring secure configurations and proper documentation. 

• Collaborate with Quality and Compliance teams to maintain audit readiness and alignment with GxP practices. 
  
  Education and Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or Information Technology required; advanced degree preferred. 

• Minimum of 8 years of progressive experience in IT infrastructure and operations, with at least 3 years in leadership or project management. 

• Experience in FDA 21 CFR Part 11, IT SOX, and GxP-regulated environments; prior exposure to GMP laboratories preferred. 

• Consulting or small/emerging company experience in the life sciences sector highly desirable. 

• Strong background in network infrastructure, including routers, firewalls, DNS, load balancers,etc.  Palo Alto experience, a plus. 
  
  NOTE: Applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States on a permanent basis. At this time, the Company does not provide, and will not provide in the future, sponsorship for employment visas.