Director Advanced Solutions for Research

SURF is looking for a visionary leader with a passion for science and technology who can help the Netherlands excel in cutting-edge research. As Director of Advanced Solutions for Research, you will guide digital infrastructures for supercomputing, AI, and data-intensive research, inspire highly specialized teams, and position SURF nationally and internationally. Are you ready to make a difference? Apply now and help build the digital future of education and research.

Where you will work
SURF is the cooperative IT organization of and for Dutch education and research. SURF develops and manages groundbreaking digital solutions that contribute to excellent education, leading research, and sustainable collaboration. We work together with our members on digital sovereignty, innovation, and public value in the Netherlands and internationally.

In recent years, SURF has grown significantly in size, responsibility, and impact. This growth requires greater focus, integration, and effectiveness. That is why we are building a new structure for a single, agile organization: 1SURF. In the new structure, an integrated management team is positioned under the board of directors. The new management team consists of six directors: four business units and two strategic support units. Together, they form the heart of SURF. They are responsible for their own domain and manage the organization as a whole in an integrated manner. Each director contributes to strategic policy-making, strengthening public values, and realizing high-quality and future-proof services.

The Advanced Solutions for Research unit
The Advanced Solutions for Research unit forms the innovative heart of SURF for digital research infrastructure. From this unit, we enable groundbreaking scientific research with state-of-the-art facilities for supercomputing, data-intensive research, AI infrastructures, and international collaboration within a Research Commons.

The unit consists of three departments: Compute Services, Data Services, and Applications & Technologies. This is where service development, project-based innovation, and specialist support come together. Among other things, the teams offer access to HPC and HTC environments, storage, processing and analysis capacity for large-scale datasets, and support in applying new technologies such as AI and quantum computing. In addition, they actively contribute to open science, FAIR data, reproducibility, and interdisciplinary applications.

As director, you will lead both the development and operation of these high-quality infrastructures and manage a unit of approximately 143 FTE. You will connect service provision and innovation, focus on effectiveness, and strategically position SURF within the international research ecosystem. In doing so, you will represent SURF to, among others, NWO, European research infrastructures, and universities. SURF actively invests in international networks and European collaborations; together with partners, you will set a new course that is scalable, sustainable, and future-oriented and in line with the scientific ambitions of the Netherlands. As a member of the management team, you will also share responsibility for the course and management of SURF as a whole.

What you will do
As Director of Advanced Solutions for Research, you will guide the development, positioning, and implementation of SURF's digital research infrastructure. You will connect vision to realization: from strategic choices around supercomputing, data, and AI to high-quality services for researchers. In doing so, you will bring innovation and exploitation together, strengthen the connection to national and international infrastructures, and ensure that SURF continues to play a leading role in the European research landscape.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Realizing the Research Commons vision and strengthening links with national and international research infrastructures.
• Developing a coherent strategy for HPC, HTC, and AI, including sustainable and innovative financing models.
• Strengthening services and support for various scientific disciplines, with a focus on quality, adoption, and ease of use.
• Positioning SURF as a leading player in the European research infrastructure landscape.
• Integrating innovation and exploitation into a single coherent and future-oriented organizational model.
• Setting up and managing information management and demand articulation within the unit, in collaboration with relationship managers and information managers, with this demand articulation feeding into SURF's strategic portfolio process.
• Taking responsibility for the domain vision, contributing to the LCPM process, and translating architectures and standards (such as HOSA and the SURF Enterprise Architecture) into concrete development frameworks, together with the enterprise architect.

Your skills and experience
You are a strategic leader with a clear vision on the digitization of research and science. You oversee complex ecosystems and know how to provide direction and exert influence within them. With a strong innovative drive, you understand the needs of researchers and anticipate what is to come. You inspire highly specialized teams and move with authority in administrative and international networks. In this way, you make an impact at the intersection of technology, science, and public value.

What you bring

• Experience with digital research infrastructures, for example at universities, NWO, HPC, or AI organizations;
• A strategic vision on the future of research and science policy;
• Demonstrable experience in leading complex, technically driven organizations or programs;
• Strong networking skills and administrative sensitivity, nationally and internationally;
• Entrepreneurship: creative in attracting resources and business-minded towards suppliers;
• Affinity with innovation, open science, data ecosystems, and interdisciplinary collaboration.

Leadership profile
SURF expects its directors to demonstrate transformational, connective, and integral leadership. You provide direction with a clear vision, act consistently in line with public values, and develop people with confidence and clarity. You look beyond your own unit and take joint responsibility for the course and management of SURF as a whole.

As a member of the management team, you actively collaborate with fellow directors on organization-wide issues and strategic choices. You are visible, decisive, and encourage a culture of ownership, transparency, and continuous development, in which collaboration and impact are central.

Required competencies

1. Vision: Develops a strategic course for scientific infrastructure
2. Anticipation: Recognizes trends, risks, and technological opportunities in a timely manner
3. Entrepreneurship: Brings innovation and value creation to complex stakeholder environments
4. Networking: Connects SURF with NWO, the EU, institutions, and international networks
5. Decisiveness: Dares to choose a course in a context that is complex in terms of content
6. Helicopter view: Oversees the connection between technology, research, and policy
7. Coaching leadership: Focuses on development, ownership, and collaboration
8. Organizational sensitivity: Understands SURF as a cooperative and responds to the expectations of members.

Procedure
The selection process consists of a possible pre-selection, two interview rounds, an assessment, a cultural fit interview with the Supervisory Board, and a discussion of employment terms. This is followed by a carefully designed onboarding program to ensure a strong start at SURF.