Principal Disaster Recovery Engineer

Principal, Disaster Recovery Engineer

About Northern Trust:

Northern Trust, a Fortune 500 company, is a globally recognized, award-winning financial institution that has been in continuous operation since 1889.

Northern Trust is proud to provide innovative financial services and guidance to the world’s most successful individuals, families, and institutions by remaining true to our enduring principles of service, expertise, and integrity. With more than 130 years of financial experience and over 22,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

Position : Principal, Disaster Recovery Engineer
Location : Pune

We are seeking an accomplished Lead / Principal IT Disaster Recovery Engineer to serve as the organization's foremost authority on resilience, recoverability, and business continuity. This role demands a practitioner who can architect enterprise-grade DR strategies across hybrid environments, lead cross-functional response efforts, and embed a culture of preparedness throughout the organization.

Operating at the intersection of cloud engineering, cybersecurity, and governance, you will own end-to-end DR lifecycle management — from design and testing through executive reporting and regulatory compliance. You will act as a technical mentor, program lead, and incident commander, directly influencing the organization's risk posture and its ability to withstand and recover from disruptive events.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

DR Strategy & Architecture

• Lead the design, development, and continuous improvement of enterprise DR and Business Continuity (BC) programs across cloud and on-premises environments.
• Architect multi-region and hybrid failover solutions on AWS, Azure, and GCP, incorporating active-active, active-passive, and pilot-light patterns.
• Define Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) for all critical systems and ensure solutions consistently meet contractual and regulatory thresholds.
• Establish infrastructure-as-code (IaC) standards for DR automation using Terraform, CloudFormation, or Pulumi.

On-Premises & Data Center Resilience

• Oversee DR architecture for on-premises data centers including storage replication (NetApp SnapMirror, Pure Storage ActiveCluster), SAN/NAS failover, and bare-metal recovery.
• Manage relationships with colocation and secondary data center providers to ensure contractual alignment with DR objectives.
• Drive server virtualization recovery strategies using VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM) and Veeam.

Cybersecurity & Ransomware Recovery

• Design and maintain immutable backup architectures and air-gapped environments to protect against ransomware and destructive cyberattacks.
• Lead cyber recovery exercises simulating ransomware scenarios; document and refine clean-room recovery playbooks.
• Collaborate with the CISO and SOC to integrate DR procedures into the Incident Response (IR) lifecycle, ensuring seamless handoffs from containment to recovery.
• Champion zero-trust recovery principles, including identity verification during failover and integrity validation of recovered workloads.

Compliance, Audit & Governance

• Maintain DR program alignment with ISO 22301, NIST SP 800-34, SOC 2 Type II, and applicable industry regulations (HIPAA, PCI-DSS, GDPR as relevant).
• Own all DR-related evidence gathering, documentation, and remediation activities for internal and external audits.
• Report program health, test outcomes, and risk metrics to executive leadership and the Board on a regular cadence.
• Establish governance frameworks including DR policy, standards, and exception management processes.

Testing, Drills & Continuous Improvement

• Plan and execute full-scale DR tests (tabletop, functional, and full failover) across production-equivalent environments at least twice per year.
• Track and drive closure of test findings; maintain a risk register for unresolved gaps.
• Implement chaos engineering principles and game-day exercises to proactively uncover resilience weaknesses.

Leadership & Mentorship

• Serve as technical authority and escalation point for DR incidents and complex recovery scenarios.
• Mentor mid-level and senior engineers; drive DR awareness and preparedness across application, infrastructure, and security teams.
• Lead vendor evaluations and manage strategic relationships with DR tooling and cloud service providers.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

• 15+ years in IT infrastructure, with at least 8 years focused on Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity, or Site Reliability Engineering.
• Deep expertise designing and operating DR solutions on at least two major cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP) including cross-region replication, Route 53 / Traffic Manager / Cloud DNS failover, and managed database HA.
• Extensive hands-on experience with on-premises DR technologies: VMware SRM, Veeam, Zerto, or equivalent.
• Demonstrated experience building and executing ransomware recovery programs, including immutable storage and cyber recovery runbooks.
• Strong command of compliance frameworks: ISO 22301, NIST SP 800-34 / CSF, SOC 2, and relevant sector regulations.
• Proficiency in scripting and automation (Python, PowerShell, Bash) and IaC tools (Terraform, CloudFormation).
• Proven track record leading enterprise-wide DR exercises and driving RTO/RPO attainment at scale.
• Exceptional technical writing skills; able to produce executive-ready reports and detailed runbooks with equal clarity.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Relevant certifications: AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional, Google Professional Cloud Architect, Azure Solutions Architect Expert, CBCP, MBCI, or CISSP.
• Experience with chaos engineering platforms (AWS Fault Injection Simulator, Gremlin, LitmusChaos).
• Familiarity with SIEM / SOAR tooling and integration of DR workflows into security operations pipelines.
• Background in financial services, healthcare, or other highly regulated industries.
• Experience with container-based DR strategies using Kubernetes (EKS, AKS, GKE) and service mesh resilience patterns.

Working with Us:

As a Northern Trust partner, greater achievements await. You will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture in an organization where financial strength and stability is an asset that emboldens us to explore new ideas.

Movement within the organization is encouraged, senior leaders are accessible, and you can take pride in working for a company committed to assisting the communities we serve! Join a workplace with a greater purpose.

We’d love to learn more about how your interests and experience could be a fit with one of the world’s most admired and sustainable companies! Build your career with us and apply today. #MadeForGreater

Reasonable accommodation

Northern Trust is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please email our HR Service Center at MyHRHelp@ntrs.com.

We hope you’re excited about the role and the opportunity to work with us. We value an inclusive workplace and understand flexibility means different things to different people.

Apply today and talk to us about your flexible working requirements and together we can achieve greater.

About Our Pune Office

The Northern Trust Pune office, established in 2016, is now home to over 3,000 employees. The office handles various functions, including Operations for Asset Servicing and Wealth Management, as well as delivering critical technology solutions that support business operations across the globe.

Our Pune team takes our commitment to service to heart. In 2024, they volunteered more than 10,000+ hours into the communities where they live and work. Learn more.

Experience Level

Senior Level