EMEA Development & Permitting Lead

• Lead and inspire a high-performing team through empowerment, accountability, coaching, and a strong people-first culture.
• Partner with senior leaders and stakeholders to shape strategy, drive workforce planning, strengthen business health, and deliver key organizational priorities.
• Set clear objectives and KPIs, transforming complex information into actionable insights that support business decisions and organizational change.
• Champion culture, engagement, diversity and inclusion, talent development, onboarding, and compliance excellence across the organization.
• Oversee permitting, approvals, and development activities for new data centre projects across South and Central EMEA, ensuring successful project delivery and risk mitigation.
• Build and maintain strong relationships with regulatory bodies, government authorities, developers, and internal partners to secure approvals, resolve challenges, and accelerate data centre development.

• Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering, Construction, Real Estate, Urban Planning or equivalent area.
• Proven ability to shape strategy, inspire teams, and drive execution, ensuring successful delivery of key business objectives and organizational priorities.
• Substantial portfolio management, real estate, or office management experience and people management experience.

Background Check Requirements:

Ability to meet Microsoft, customer and/or government security screening requirements are required for this role. These requirements include, but are not limited to the following specialized security screenings:

Microsoft Cloud Background Check: This position will be required to pass the Microsoft Cloud background check upon hire/transfer and every two years thereafter.

Microsoft is looking for a EMEA Development & Permitting Lead covering Europe to have a key role in coordinating across internal teams (e.g. Environment, Engineering and Design, Construction, Government Affairs, Community Engagement etc.) to ensure delivery of operation-ready data centre sites. They will support the development and execution of permitting strategies for the lifecycle delivery of datacentre development and will be a key contributor in the execution of comprehensive land development and permitting programs and to the Microsoft pre-construction program.

The MS datacentre development portfolio consists of complex, multi-disciplinary, large scale, multi-year datacentre construction and lease projects. The Microsoft Datacentre Land Development team supports the development and delivery of Microsoft’s datacentre portfolio from site selection through design, construction and handover to operations.

Microsoft’s Cloud Operations & Innovation (CO+I) is the engine that powers our cloud services. As a CO+I EMEA Development & Permitting Lead, you will perform a key role in delivering the core infrastructure and foundational technologies for Microsoft’s online services including Bing, Office 365, Xbox, OneDrive, and the Microsoft Azure platform. As a group, CO+I is focused on the personal and professional development for all employees and offers trainings and growth opportunities including Career Rotation Programs, Diversity & Inclusion trainings and events, and professional certifications.

Our infrastructure is comprised of a large global portfolio of more than 100 datacenters and 1 million servers. Our foundation is built upon and managed by a team of subject matter experts working to support services for more than 1 billion customers and 20 million businesses in over 90 countries worldwide.

With environmental sustainability and optimization at the forefront of our datacenter design and operations, we continue to grow and evolve as we meet the ever-changing business demands that hold Microsoft as a world-class cloud provider.

Do you want to empower billions across the world? Come and join us in CO+I and be at the forefront of the action?