Position Title:

Vice President, IT Infrastructure Location:

Southeastern Wisconsin Position Summary:

Our client is a privately held, family-owned distributor of business, industrial, and operational supplies, known across its industry for the speed, breadth, and reliability of its fulfillment operations. It is a multibillion-dollar organization with a large, geographically distributed workforce and a long-standing reputation as one of the most stable and respected employers in its region. What sets this organization apart technologically is rare: rather than running on a purchased ERP platform, its core systems are almost entirely custom-built and maintained in-house, giving its technology teams genuine ownership over architecture, code, and infrastructure design. The company operates its own data centers end-to-end — network, compute, storage, power, and cooling — supporting a mission-critical, always-on business. IT is not treated as a cost center here; it sits at the center of how the business runs. This is a succession-planned Vice President, IT Infrastructure opportunity. The incoming leader will step into the title and full scope of the role from day one, while the current VP remains on hand for a defined transition period as an advisor and mentor — sharing institutional knowledge without retaining direct reports. It is a rare chance to inherit a large, well-resourced infrastructure organization, build on a strong foundation, and shape its next chapter. Why this role? Step into a large, well-established infrastructure organization with genuine engineering ownership — including in-house data centers, custom-built core systems, and direct influence over enterprise architecture A structured, well-supported transition: the outgoing leader remains in an advisory capacity to mentor and share knowledge through onboarding Exceptional organizational stability, low turnover, and consistent reinvestment in technology and people A genuine seat at the table — infrastructure leadership partners directly with senior executives and influences business strategy, not just technology operations Meaningful potential for continued career growth within IT leadership over time

Responsibilities:

Defines and executes an enterprise infrastructure strategy aligned to business objectives, long-term growth, and risk tolerance• Leads infrastructure strategy and operations across a large, complex, multi-site enterprise environment supporting mission-critical business operations Drives infrastructure modernization initiatives from design to retirement, including automation and platform rationalization, to improve agility, scalability, and operational efficiency Provides executive-level reporting on health, risk, performance, and investment tradeoffs related to infrastructure Partners closely with Application Development, Security, Facilities, and business leaders to ensure infrastructure enables — not constrains — business outcomes Oversees infrastructure technologies and practices in support of enterprise security policies Ensures infrastructure teams follow approved risk, access, and operational controls Oversees preparation and management of the annual Infrastructure Capital Planning process Balances cost optimization with resiliency, scalability, and service quality Owns strategic relationships with key infrastructure vendors, partners, and service providers Oversees capacity planning and usage reporting for data, voice, server, storage, and network systems Ensures high-quality service delivery through mature service management practices, measurable SLAs, and continuous improvement of availability, performance, and end-user experience Leads a team of internal professionals and external service providers responsible for consistent operational delivery, support, and availability Builds a high-performing leadership team, develops succession plans, and fosters a culture of accountability, engineering discipline, and continuous improvement Establishes expectations around engineering discipline, documentation, and best-practice methodologies

Required Qualifications:

Bachelor's degree 15+ years of infrastructure leadership experience in a large, complex enterprise environment Experience managing a large-scale data center Strong track record of collaborating to align technology strategy with business goals Proven success leading mission-critical infrastructure operations across multiple sites Experience operating in an on-premises, non-cloud-reliant enterprise environment strongly preferred Experience within a custom-built or non-ERP-dependent technology environment is a plus Demonstrated ability to build, mentor, and grow a leadership bench of future technology leaders