Eric Bird’s career has grown from the help desk through systems and network administration into cloud infrastructure, security, and increasingly, technology leadership. Rather than following a traditional leadership track, he built his experience by staying close to technology and gradually expanding the scope of the problems he was responsible for solving.
His interest in cybersecurity began while working at Consigli Construction, where he worked with the operations team and gained exposure to areas such as endpoint detection, logging technologies, and messaging security. It was an opportunity to understand how security fit within the broader infrastructure environment and became an area he continued to pursue.
That experience became particularly valuable when Eric joined Akoya Biosciences, where he helped strengthen the security program as the company continued to grow. His responsibilities expanded across security tooling, incident response, and longer term program development, giving him hands on experience with the different stages of building a more mature security environment.
As the program evolved, Eric helped expand its capabilities and bring in additional resources, including support for around the clock security operations. With a stronger foundation in place and a dedicated security engineer eventually taking greater ownership, Eric shifted his focus more heavily toward infrastructure.
The experience gave him a valuable perspective on how security and infrastructure intersect, something that continues to influence his approach today.
Bringing Security Into Infrastructure
After a successful tenure at Akoya, Eric joined ElevateBio, where his role has continued to evolve. He initially came into the organization focused on cloud operations before expanding his responsibilities across a broader infrastructure program.
Today, Eric leads the Infrastructure Operations Center, or IOC. The program spans systems, cloud and network operations, with AI operations becoming an increasingly important part of its scope. Security is integrated throughout each of those areas rather than operating separately from the infrastructure program.
For Eric, his background across both disciplines helps him think beyond which security tools are in place. He is equally interested in how those tools are deployed, how they are configured, and where automation can improve the environment.
That operational mindset has become central to his role. His focus is shifting from personally providing services across each area to creating a program that can operate more efficiently while still meeting the needs of security and other stakeholders.
“I came in as a lead individual contributor and now I’m transitioning toward more leadership,” he explains. “My focus has shifted from being the person providing the services toward being more of an enabler.”
From Technical Expert to Leader
As Eric takes on more leadership responsibility, some of the most valuable lessons have come from an unexpected place: his earliest days working on a help desk.
Infrastructure roles can naturally become centered around projects and technology. Leadership has required Eric to shift more of his attention toward understanding the business and building relationships with the people his program supports.
“I actually draw on a lot of experience from just being a help desk person” he shares. “In those roles, you’re forced to connect with people first and have that customer service mentality. You understand their needs more than just the technologies you’re providing them.”
He continues, “I came up through the classic help desk, sysadmin, network admin, infrastructure approach. Now I’m trying to deputize and promote technical authorities from within my program and facilitate those relationships.”
The Rapid Rise of AI Operations
Eric’s priorities have changed quickly since joining Elevate. His first year was heavily focused on cloud, including how the organization could govern its environment while continuing to scale securely. The following year brought a greater emphasis on network operations and improving how the organization worked with its service providers.
Then AI operations entered the conversation.
Eric sees an opportunity for AI to remove some of the limitations that slow people down. Rather than requiring IT to solve every challenge directly, employees can increasingly use AI tools to address certain needs themselves. That has opened new possibilities for the business while creating a different challenge for technology leaders tasked with understanding how those tools are being used.
For Eric, there is no perfect playbook. The technology is moving too quickly, and organizations are developing their approaches in real time. His response has been to identify the people within the business who are already engaging with AI and strengthen those relationships so his team can better understand emerging use cases.
Opting Out vs. Opting In
As AI adoption grows, Eric believes technology leaders need to understand what employees are trying to accomplish before drawing conclusions.
“One approach that has been great is leading with listening,” he explains. “What are you doing? How are you trying to do it? What can I learn from what you’re doing as the user?”
The speed of AI makes that approach even more important. New capabilities are reaching employees before many IT or governance teams have an opportunity to fully evaluate them.
“2026 is the era of opt out. It’s no longer about opting in,” Eric observes. “Across the industry, new capabilities are reaching people faster than governance teams can evaluate them. That’s why staying close to how people work matters so much. It helps keep the technology from getting ahead of the conversation.”
For Eric, keeping pace begins with visibility and communication. By staying close to employees who are experimenting with the technology, his team can better understand what is happening across the business and determine where IT can help enable those use cases responsibly.
Connecting Technology to Business
That same emphasis on understanding people extends beyond AI. As Eric’s role becomes more strategic, he is increasingly focused on ensuring the teams and providers he works with understand why their work matters.
Rather than treating infrastructure projects as isolated technical initiatives, he tries to connect decisions back to a corporate goal or IT objective. That context helps teams understand the outcome they are working toward instead of just completing an individual task.
One of the more difficult parts of that responsibility is bringing together providers that naturally operate within different specialties. Eric describes the challenge as “blending context,” ensuring that each partner understands how its work connects with other areas and with the broader needs of the business.
His role has increasingly become one of facilitating those connections rather than sitting at the center of every interaction. It is a change Eric has found particularly rewarding because it allows the program to scale while giving others greater ownership.
Continuing to Learn
Eric approaches his own career development with the same emphasis on relationships. He credits mentors, colleagues, and service providers with helping him grow, but much of that learning begins with curiosity and a willingness to ask questions.
“It is important to always listen, learn, and be curious about what other people are doing, how they’re doing it and how they’re thinking about things,” he shares. “That has been very unlocking for me.”
He encourages others to treat the connections they make at industry events as relationships they can actually use. When a new challenge arises, Eric regularly reaches out to people in his network to understand how they are approaching the same problem.
“Don’t be afraid to actually use your network,” he advises. “When you encounter issues or have interesting puzzles to solve, ping some of those people. What are you doing? How are you thinking about this stuff?”
Long term, Eric sees those experiences leading toward a CTO role. His interest extends beyond infrastructure into how technology and products are designed to solve specific problems, something he describes as a longstanding fascination.
“I am still figuring out the pathway to get there,” he shares, “but that has been my North Star.”
For Eric, that path continues to take shape as his role expands from technical execution toward leadership. Whether he is building an infrastructure program, navigating the rapid adoption of AI, or developing stronger connections across the business, he continues to grow by remaining close to both the technology and the people it is designed to support.
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