About
A specialist practice for infrastructure employers.
Critical Path Hiring is led by Czarina Tabayoyong and works a narrow category: the people who design, commission, operate and scale data centers and AI infrastructure.
Who runs the work
Czarina Tabayoyong is the founder and principal recruiter, with more than 15 years of recruiting experience in technical recruiting across software engineering, cloud infrastructure, platform, AI and ML. Her background includes recruiting cloud and data center architecture talent at AWS Professional Services, supporting high-volume recruiting across multiple job families at Amazon, and building PMO and project delivery recruiting for hyperscale data center buildouts across active campuses in Texas and Virginia.
She calibrates every engagement, owns the research, makes the screening decisions and stays accountable through the start date. Where AI is used, it organizes market research and surfaces candidates; it does not decide who is submitted.
Why the category is narrow
Infrastructure hiring is unforgiving: a commissioning milestone does not move because a requisition sat in a queue, and a live electrical room is not a place for someone who only interviews well. Staying inside one category is what makes an honest market read possible, including telling an employer that a role is not fillable as written.
Who this practice serves
Hyperscale and colocation operators, GPU cloud and AI platform teams, EPC and commissioning firms, and OEMs. Searches are frequently confidential: replacing a site lead, standing up a team before a build is announced, or testing a market without signaling to it.
Disciplines
Exactly which seats this practice places.
Each discipline has a published hiring guide with planning bands, screening questions and the failure modes we see most often.
- Critical Facilities Engineer
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
- Commissioning Agent (CxA)
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
- Data Center Technician
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
- MEP Coordinator
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
- Data Center Construction Project Manager
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
- GPU Cluster Engineer
Screening focus, compensation context and market risk for this role family.
Adjacent seats we support inside the same programs: facilities managers and chief engineers, controls and BMS specialists, QA/QC inspectors, schedulers, and site launch leadership. See every role we recruit.
Markets
Where the searches run.
U.S. data center and AI infrastructure markets with a published local read: who competes for the pool, what moves the band and where supply is constrained.
Searches also run across the United States for traveling commissioning and construction talent, and remote-first for AI infrastructure engineering.
Standards
How this practice operates.
One accountable principal
The person who calibrates the role runs the research, the outreach and the offer. There is no handoff to an account manager or a junior sourcer.
Narrow by design
Data center and AI infrastructure only. Vocabulary, comp reality and market structure in these disciplines take years to learn and do not transfer from generalist recruiting.
The research transfers to you
Target universes, outreach messaging, comp evidence and pipeline notes belong to your team when an engagement ends. That is part of the method, not a paid extra.
Delivery standards, not outcome promises
We commit to research depth, outreach volume, reporting cadence and response times. Outcomes depend on market conditions, scope, compensation and process speed.
Method
Calibrate, Map, Engage, Validate, Close, Transfer.
The same six steps run on every engagement, with the depth adjusted to the model you buy.
- Step 01
Calibrate
A written role brief, an agreed scorecard, and a market reality check on scope, comp and location before outreach starts.
- Step 02
Map
AI-assisted mapping across AI infrastructure companies, operators, EPCs and OEMs, layered on a network built one conversation at a time.
- Step 03
Engage
Direct, human outreach with weekly reporting on volume, response quality and the objections we are hearing.
- Step 04
Validate
Structured screens against the scorecard, written candidate cases including risks, and comp expectations on the record.
- Step 05
Close
Offer strategy, counteroffer exposure assessment, and resignation and relocation support through the start date.
- Step 06
Transfer
Your team keeps the pipeline, research files, messaging and comp data. The work stays with you when the engagement ends.
What the engagement requires from you
- A named hiring sponsor who can make decisions
- An approved compensation range before outreach begins
- Feedback on submitted candidates within 48 hours
- Interview slots held open during the active search window
We commit to delivery standards, research depth, outreach volume, reporting cadence and response times. Outcomes depend on market conditions, scope, compensation and process speed.
Want a read on your hiring plan?
Bring the role set and the deadline. You'll get an honest assessment, including when a search is not the right answer.