Principal Operations Engineer
Confirmed on the employer's own hiring board on Nov 10, 2026. First seen by Alion on Aug 5, 2026.
At Bulk, our mission is to build sustainable infrastructure that supports the digital society of tomorrow. As one of the leading providers of sustainable, high-performance data center solutions in the Nordics, we design and operate infrastructure that powers artificial intelligence and the digital society - efficiently, securely, and with 100% renewable energy. We are now looking to hire a Principal Operations Engineer to play a central role in building the programs and engineering standards behind reliable operations across our growing data center portfolio.
This is a program ownership role for someone technical enough to implement programs and lead changes. You will own change management, incident response and risk reviews, write engineering standards, and build root cause analysis framework our teams work to.
Reporting to Chris, our Engineering Director, you will work across the whole portfolio rather than inside one site, and you will be a part of the escalation path if critical incidents occur. This is a senior individual contributor role, so your standards get adopted on credibility rather than on a reporting line. Within the first year: a change management program in use across sites, a root cause analysis framework our engineers run, and a measurable fall in repeat incidents.
What you’ll do:
As our Principal Operations Engineer, your key responsibilities will be:
Programs, standards and engineering practice
Own and develop the change management program, and the standards and training that go with it.
Build the root cause analysis framework our engineers and site teams work to.
Run the incident response and drill programs, including incident response training.
Run risk reviews, and set the risk and redundancy targets our sites are measured against.
Write and maintain the technical policies, procedures and engineering standards for operations, and the direction they point in.
Teach and mentor engineers across the organization, so the standards live in how people work and not only in a document.
Reliability, risk and assets
Go deep when something breaks, past the component that failed and into why the failure scenario was possible at all.
Perform site deep dives and health checks against design and target risk levels.
Develop asset strategies covering criticality, maintenance plans and sparing, aligned to ISO 55000.
Set maintenance and testing regimes, including condition-based maintenance for critical equipment
Incidents and escalation
Act as senior technical escalation for site operations during incidents.
Take incident commander tasks for electrical emergencies.
Lead postmortems through to permanent remediation rather than a closed ticket.
New build, equipment and capacity
Bring operational requirements into design reviews and the new build phase.
Evaluate and sign off customer capacity requests on time, with the analysis behind each decision documented.
Develop operational commissioning requirements, and witness FAT and SAT, performance tests, integrated systems testing and black building tests.
Qualify vendors, approve equipment specifications and give procurement technical input on replacement and new equipment.
Who are you?
You are a senior engineer who would rather build the framework than fight the same failure twice. You go deep when something breaks, past the component that failed and into why the scenario was possible at all, and you stay calm and clear while it is still happening. You get standards adopted through engineering credibility rather than a reporting line, which means being honest about risk and working with site teams, projects and procurement rather than around them. You are comfortable building programs where little exists today, and you build for the portfolio we will have rather than only the one we have now.
What you bring:
At least 12 years in mission critical systems, including responsibility across more than one site.
Deep knowledge of MV/LV architecture for concurrently maintainable and fault tolerant topologies, including selective coordination and protection settings.
Hands-on knowledge of UPS (double conversion and lithium-ion), battery systems and generators, including closed transition, black start and load bank testing, and of mechanical systems such as chillers, air handling units and liquid cooling.
A proven record of owning and implementing operational programs, not only running programs someone else designed.
Reliability engineering depth, meaning failure scenario analysis, root cause analysis, FMEA and RCFA.
Reliability and maintenance strategy experience, including condition-based maintenance for breakers, transformers and UPS, and IR and partial discharge testing.
Experience as incident commander on major electrical events.
Working command of Uptime Tier concepts, BICSI 002, EN 50600-2-2, ISO 55000, NFPA 70E and IEEE 1584, and of EPMS and SCADA.
Commissioning experience is considered an advantage.
Higher education in engineering or a related technical discipline. Extensive relevant experience may compensate for formal education.
Excellent communication skills in English; proficiency in a Scandinavian language is considered an advantage.
Why join us?
Influence how key operational processes are shaped and developed.
Become part of a growing organization with a strong sustainability mission.
Work with critical infrastructure that supports the digital society of tomorrow.
Collaborate with highly skilled colleagues across disciplines and locations.
What we offer our Bulkies:
A dynamic, growth-oriented workplace with a strong sustainability focus
Comprehensive insurance (health, travel - business & private) and annual health check
Additional time off during Easter and Christmas
Monthly contribution to home internet costs and sustainable commuting
Annual wellness allowance to support an active lifestyle
Fully paid parental leave
Take the next step in your career and join us as we build the future of digital infrastructure in Norway and beyond!
Next steps
We review applicants continuously, and we encourage you to apply as soon as possible. To apply, please upload your CV and a cover letter detailing your relevant experience and why you are the ideal candidate for this role.
We conduct background checks on all hires. We may also require you to obtain security clearance and a police certificate of conduct.
Bulk aim for gender balance and a diverse workforce. We do not discriminate against gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, pregnancy and/or disability. We appreciate the time you have spent reading this, and if the role aligns with your aspirations, we encourage you to apply!