Hospital for Special Surgery

Disaster Recovery and Major Incident Response Manager

Hospital for Special Surgery$132K — $201K *
Healthcare
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 8+ years in IT operations, major incident management, or disaster recovery.
  • Experience in an incident command or major incident leadership role.
  • Strong knowledge of disaster recovery and business continuity concepts.
  • Proven capacity to lead cross-functional teams under pressure.
  • Excellent communication skills with executive presence.
  • Availability for afterhours, weekend, and holiday responsibilities.

Responsibilities

  • Serve as Active or Backup Responder on Duty for major incidents and outages.
  • Coordinate incident response efforts and manage escalations during disasters.
  • Oversee disaster recovery plan activation and execution during events.
  • Maintain documentation and operational oversight for disaster recovery processes.
  • Lead root cause analysis and post-incident reviews to improve processes.
  • Engage with stakeholders and provide updates to IT leadership on recovery efforts.

Benefits

  • Comprehensive healthcare coverage options.
  • Retirement savings plan with employer matching.
  • Generous paid time off and holiday leave policies.
  • Opportunity for professional development and certifications.
  • Flexible work arrangements to support work-life balance.
Full Job Description
Emp Status
Regular Full time

Work Shift
Day (United States of America)

Compensation Range
The base pay scale for this position is $132,000.00 - $201,500.00. In addition, this position will be eligible for additional benefits consistent with the role. The salary of the finalist selected for this role will be determined based on various factors, including but not limited to: scope of role, level of experience, education, accomplishments, internal equity, budget, and subject to Fair Market Value evaluation. The hiring range listed is a good faith determination of potential compensation at the time of this job advertisement and may be modified in the future.

What you will be doing
Key Responsibilities
Active and Backup Responder on Duty (AROD/BROD)
  • Serve as Active or Backup Responder on Duty (AROD/BROD) on a scheduled rotation for major incidents, declared disasters, and extended outages.
  • Function as the single point of command and escalation during DR and major incidents in coordination with the Executive on Duty (EOD).
  • Assess incident severity and determine when to escalate to disaster recovery activation in collaboration with IT EOD and business leadership.
  • Coordinate cross-functional response efforts involving infrastructure, application teams, cybersecurity, vendors, and business operations.
  • Lead real-time incident coordination calls and ensure clear task assignment, escalation, and decision tracking.
  • Oversee internal and external communications related to service outages, recovery progress, and restoration status. Ensure continuous 24/7 readiness by validating that playbooks, contact lists, tooling access, vendor support, and escalation paths are current, accessible, and executable at all times.
  • Ensure effective shift handoffs, documentation continuity, and leadership coverage during prolonged or multi-day incidents.


Disaster Recovery Execution & Oversight
  • Own the activation and execution of disaster recovery plans and runbooks during declared events.
  • Coordinate technical recovery activities across infrastructure, platform, and application teams.
  • Ensure application recovery is validated by appropriate application and business owners prior to declaring service restoration.
  • Maintain operational oversight for prolonged recovery efforts, including shift coverage, resource planning, and vendor engagement.
  • Ensure recovery actions are executed in accordance with approved DR standards, policies, and tiering requirements.


DR Program Governance & Readiness
  • Partner with the DR/BC Governance function to maintain enterprise DR readiness across all application tiers.
  • Own the creation, maintenance, and continuous improvement of disaster recovery and major incident playbooks to ensure they are:
    • Present for all in-scope applications
    • Technically accurate and executable
    • Reviewed and validated on a defined cadence.
  • Partner with IT Operations, Infrastructure, Applications, and Cybersecurity teams to validate technical accuracy and operational effectiveness of disaster recovery and major incident playbooks.
  • Support application tiering decisions and ensure recovery strategies align to business impact and risk tolerance.
  • Lead the planning, execution, and facilitation of disaster recovery testing, tabletop exercises, and simulations; ensure findings are documented and tracked to closure.
  • Ensure exercise outcomes, identified gaps, and remediation actions are documented, tracked, and resolved within defined timeframes.
  • Ensure DR processes align with internal policies, regulatory requirements, and audit expectations.


Post-Incident Review & Continuous Improvement
  • Lead the creation of Root Cause Analysis (RCA) documents and/or postmortem reviews following major incidents and disaster recovery events.
  • Ensure lessons learned, control gaps, and process improvements are documented and assigned to accountable owners.
  • Track remediation actions through completion and provide status updates to leadership and governance committees.
  • Identify recurring incident patterns or recovery risks and recommend corrective actions.
  • Develop and present actionable, data-driven recommendations to IT and business leadership to improve disaster recovery readiness, response effectiveness, and operational resilience, including recovery strategy enhancements, tooling gaps, staffing models, and escalation processes.


Stakeholder & Executive Engagement
  • Provide regular status updates and briefings to IT leadership, business partners, and governance committees.
  • Escalate recovery risks, resource constraints, or unresolved issues to executive leadership as appropriate.
  • Partner with business continuity leaders to ensure alignment between IT recovery and operational continuity procedures.


Required Qualifications
  • 8+ years of experience in IT operations, major incident management, disaster recovery, or service management
  • Strong demonstrated experience acting in an incident command or major incident leadership role.
  • Strong understanding of:
    • Disaster recovery and business continuity concepts
    • Application tiering and dependency management
    • Infrastructure and application recovery strategies
  • Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams during high-pressure incidents.
  • Effective communication skills and executive-presence.
  • This role holds operational command responsibility during declared disasters and major IT incidents.
  • Afterhours, weekend, and holiday availability are essential functions of the role.
  • Success requires the ability to drive execution, accountability, and remediation through influence across multiple teams.


Preferred Qualifications
  • Experience in healthcare, regulated, or audit-driven environments.
  • Bachelor's degree in computer science, Information Technology, Business Administration or a related field
  • Familiarity with ITIL, ISO 22301, NIST, or similar frameworks
  • Experience leading and supporting large, complex application portfolios or programs.
  • Experience working with third-party vendors during recovery events.


Success Looks Like
  • Disaster recovery events are coordinated, decisive, and well-documented.
  • Recovery timelines improve due to clear command and role clarity.
  • Audit findings related to DR execution, testing, or governance are reduced or eliminated.
  • IT Infrastructure, Application, and business owners clearly understand their roles during incidents.
  • DR transitions from a reactive effort to a repeatable, trusted operational capability.

About Hospital for Special Surgery

Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) is a hospital in New York City that specializes in orthopedic surgery and the treatment of rheumatologic conditions. Founded in 1863 by James Knight, HSS is the oldest orthopedic hospital in the United States. The hospital has been ranked the top orthopedic hospital in the United States by U.S. News & World Report for 11 consecutive years. HSS has a staff of over 4000 employees, including more than 200 physicians and surgeons, and treats over 32,000 inpatients and 300,000 outpatients annually.
Learn more about Hospital for Special Surgery
Size
4,000 employees
Industry
Founded
1863

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