Senior IT Service Manager (OPS/SRE)

About us

Every day, we deliver safe and secure energy to homes, communities, and businesses, connecting people to the energy they need for their lives. Our expertise and track record position us uniquely to shape the sustainable future of our industry as the pace of change accelerates.To succeed, we must anticipate customer needs, reduce energy delivery costs, and pioneer flexible energy systems. This requires delivering on our promises and seeking opportunities for growth.

In IT and Digital, we collaborate closely with the diverse energy businesses within the National Grid group, revolutionizing operations through technology. Embracing Agile methodologies and Digital mindsets, we drive efficiency and bring new capabilities to internal and external customers as we lead the charge towards a carbon-free future.

Our work is critical, as National Grid powers millions of homes and businesses in the UK and US, and the technology we employ is vital to this task. The successful applicant for this position will play a crucial role in our mission, supported by our multicultural, customer-centric global team, with opportunities for professional development.

National Grid is hiring a Senior IT Service  Manager as part of our Engineering Function.  This position can be located in Warwick or London - We offer hybrid/flexible working opportunities.

Job Purpose

As a Senior IT Service Manager, you will be responsible for our global Public Cloud Platform Service & Operations, that provide advanced technical support to internal customers and contributing to the delivery of scalable tools that enhance operational efficiency. This role utilizes a combination of business and technical expertise to develop an operations strategy and drive continuous improvements based on user and stakeholder feedback. You will build relationships across Digital Platforms and Infrastructure Technology, and with our internal development community to deliver great support experience, solving technical problems, identifying opportunities for impactful automation, setting clear operational metrics and reporting. 

What you'll do

• Drive process improvement and automation initiatives to simplify, standardize, and automate critical processes, reducing manual effort and errors. Utilize emerging tools and technologies to enhance operational efficiency and service reliability.
• Collaborate with internal engineering teams, business partners, and technical leaders to coordinate planning and execution of projects.
• Review designs for large-scale projects to ensure effectiveness and efficiency. 
• Establish and maintain incident management processes and procedures to promptly identify, escalate, and resolve service disruptions and outages.
• Continuously monitor the effectiveness of automation tools in driving operational efficiency and gather user feedback for future improvements. Stay updated on AI and automation trends and implement them as appropriate. 
• Manage relationships with third-party vendors and service providers, ensuring adherence to service level agreements and contractual obligations. 
• Foster cross-group collaboration to share knowledge and advocate for automation and infrastructure best practices. Organize tech talks and knowledge-sharing sessions to drive engagement in automation opportunities across the organization.
• Provide technical guidance to resolve major incidents and equip service engineering teams with the necessary skills, tools, and resources. Ensure accountability for meeting service level objectives and communicate impact and resolution status to stakeholders. 
• Lead service engineering teams in data analysis and pattern identification to drive insights and improvements.
• Define Monitoring and analyzing platform performance metrics and reporting on the overall health of the platforms your responsible to senior leadership through dashboards.
• Incorporate the usage of AI-Driven Monitoring and performance Analytics: You will use SRE and AIOps driven monitoring and analytics solutions within the cloud and on-prem domain. This includes leveraging machine learning and data analysis techniques to identify and predict system anomalies, performance bottlenecks, potential failures and performance dashboards.

About you

• 4+ years technical experience in software engineering, network engineering, service engineering, or systems engineering
• 3+ years of experience with programming languages such as Python, C#, or JavaScript, with experience in developing scripts and automation tools for cloud infrastructure, as well as understanding of automation and scripting skills.
• 3+ years of customer service and supporting operational excellence and best practices.
• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field AND 7+ years technical experience in software engineering, network engineering, service engineering, or systems engineering.
• Proven experience as an IT Service Manager or similar role in a software development setting.
• Understanding of software development life cycle (SDLC) and agile methodologies.
• Expertise in cloud technologies like Azure.
• Ability to develop and implement long-term operational strategies that align with organizational goals. 
• Experience in transitioning teams from reactive to proactive. 
• Experience partnering and collaborating with other functional groups to drive priorities.
• Ability to work through self-directed, ambiguous situations.
• Demonstrated skills in dealing with diverse groups of engineering teams.
• Ability to direct and work independently, with an eagerness to consistently meet and exceed commitments/objectives and take ownership of complex problems.

What you'll get

A competitive salary between £60,000 – £75,000 – dependent on capability

As well as your base salary, you will receive a bonus of up to 15% of your salary for stretch performance and a competitive contributory pension scheme where we will double match your contribution to a maximum company contribution of 12%. You will also have access to a number of flexible benefits such as a share incentive plan, salary sacrifice car and technology schemes, support via employee assistance lines and matched charity giving to name a few.

More Information

The closing date for this vacancy is 8th October. However, we encourage candidates to submit their applications as early as possible and not to wait until the published closing date. National Grid’s recruitment periods can and may vary. We reserve the right to remove this advert or close it to further applications at any point during the recruitment process.

 

DE & I statement 

At National Grid, we work towards the highest standards in everything we do, including how we support, value and develop our people. Our aim is to encourage and support employees to thrive and be the best they can be. We celebrate the difference people can bring into our organisation, and welcome and encourage applicants with diverse experiences and backgrounds, and offer flexible and tailored support, at home and in the office.
Our goal is to drive, develop and operate our business in a way that results in a more inclusive culture. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, the innovation from diverse teams & perspectives and business need. We are committed to building a workforce so we can represent the communities we serve and have a working environment in which each individual feels valued, respected, fairly treated, and able to reach their full potential.

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