Principal Hardware Engineer
Senior, hands-on role responsible for the physical delivery and lifecycle management of infrastructure across data centres, build labs, and office environments.
This position combines deep technical expertise with on-site leadership, risk ownership, and accountability for engineering standards in critical environments.
What you’ll be doing
* Leading physical build, installation, relocation, and decommissioning of servers, storage, and network hardware
* Owning rack layouts, structured cabling, patching, labelling, and cable management standards
* Coordinating power, cooling, and space planning with facilities and design teams
* Producing and maintaining RAMS and operating within formal Change Management processes
* Identifying operational risks and enforcing health and safety standards
* Acting as senior technical authority and escalation point for physical infrastructure
* Mentoring field engineers and allocating work based on capability and project needs
* Supporting data centre migrations, expansions, and refresh programmes
What you’ll need
* 5+ years’ experience in data centre operations or infrastructure engineering
* Strong knowledge of compute, storage, and networking hardware
* Solid understanding of data centre best practice
* Experience working to RAMS in critical environments
* Structured cabling knowledge (Cat6/6a, OM3/OM4, fibre)
* Working knowledge of power distribution, PDUs, and load balancing
* Proven experience operating as a senior or lead engineer
Practical requirements
* Clean manual driving licence and valid passport
* Able to pass BS7858 vetting
* Eligible for UK SC clearance (5 years UK residency)
* Willing to travel and work out of hours when required