Manager - IT Service Management
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Key skills for this role
About the Role
Manulife is seeking a Manager, IT Service Management to lead a multi-disciplinary team responsible for incident resolution, service request fulfillment, and operational monitoring in Waterloo, Ontario.
Key Skills for This Role
Responsibilities
- Lead and develop a team with complementary capabilities across frontline support, technical investigation, application support, and operational monitoring
- Deliver effective incident management, service request fulfillment, and technical troubleshooting
- Collaborate with engineering teams to improve system reliability and performance
- Drive measurable improvements in service delivery and customer experience
- Oversee daily execution of Incident Management and Service Request Management, ensuring incidents are prioritized and resolved within defined SLAs
- Act as an escalation point for complex or high impact issues
- Identify opportunities to reduce manual effort through automation and self service
- Promote knowledge reuse, shift left practices, and proactive issue prevention
- Contribute to reporting on incident trends, backlog, SLA performance, and service volumes
- Support major incident coordination and post incident reviews
Requirements
- 5+ years of experience in IT delivery, support, service operations, or IT service management
- 3+ years of people management experience leading technical support, operations, engineering, or service desk teams (Tier 1 / Tier 2)
- Strong knowledge of ITSM practices (Incident, Service Request, Problem Management; familiarity with Change and Release Management)
- Experience working in ticket based environments (e.g., ServiceNow, Jira Service Management)
- Proven ability to drive KPIs through reporting, backlog management, SLA tracking, and trend analysis
- Strong communication skills, with the ability to clearly explain technical issues to both technical and non technical audiences
- Experience with documentation and knowledge management (e.g., runbooks, playbooks, reusable solutions)
- Demonstrated ability to improve processes through automation, standardization, and self service
- Exposure to SDLC and Agile environments, including supporting deployments and operational readiness
Full Job Posting
Overview
- We are seeking a Manager, IT Service Management to lead a critical part of our IT Service Management and Production Support organization.
- You will drive consistent, high quality support across customer facing products, enterprise applications, and core infrastructure services.
- You will lead a multi disciplinary team responsible for incident resolution, service request fulfillment, operational monitoring, reporting, and continuous improvement.
Position Responsibilities
- Lead and develop a team with complementary capabilities across frontline support, technical investigation, application support, and operational monitoring.
- Delivering effective incident management, service request fulfillment, and technical troubleshooting
- Collaborating with engineering teams to improve system reliability and performance
- Driving measurable improvements in service delivery and customer experience
Team Functions
- Support Specialists (Tier 1 / Tier 2): Provide application support, user administration, documentation, and escalation management
- Operations Engineers and Technical Analysts: Perform structured technical analysis, resolve system issues, and partner with engineering to reduce risks
- Operations Monitoring & Reporting Analysts: Develop dashboards, alerts, and trend reports to proactively identify and address service issues
People Leadership & Team Management
- Lead, coach, and develop a team of IT operations engineers and technical analysts
- Foster an inclusive culture of accountability, collaboration, continuous learning, and psychological safety
- Set clear performance expectations and development plans aligned to organizational goals
- Manage workforce planning, onboarding, scheduling, and capacity
- Partner with HR and leadership on talent development, engagement, and performance management
Service Desk & Incident Management
- Oversee daily execution of Incident Management and Service Request Management
- Ensure incidents are prioritized and resolved within defined SLAs
- Act as an escalation point for complex or high impact issues
- Deliver consistent, high quality user experiences through clear communication
- Ensure accurate ticket documentation and lifecycle management
IT Operations & Operational Excellence
- Maintain stability and reliability of core IT services and end user systems
- Monitor trends and recurring issues across platforms and services
- Collaborate with engineering and infrastructure teams to improve resilience
- Support major incident coordination and post incident reviews
Automation, Toil Reduction & Continuous Improvement
- Identify opportunities to reduce manual effort through automation and self service
- Promote knowledge reuse, shift left practices, and proactive issue prevention
- Use data and trends to identify improvement opportunities
- Champion continuous improvement aligned with ITSM best practices
Reporting, Metrics & Stakeholder Communication
- Contribute to reporting on incident trends, backlog, SLA performance, and service volumes
- Translate operational metrics into actionable insights for stakeholders
- Regularly review data to identify risks, opportunities, and capacity needs
- Support service reviews and broader IT service governance
Required Qualifications
- 5+ years of experience in IT delivery, support, service operations, or IT service management
- 3+ years of people management experience leading technical support, operations, engineering, or service desk teams (Tier 1 / Tier 2)
- Strong knowledge of ITSM practices (Incident, Service Request, Problem Management; familiarity with Change and Release Management)
- Experience working in ticket based environments (e.g., ServiceNow, Jira Service Management)
- Proven ability to drive KPIs through reporting, backlog management, SLA tracking, and trend analysis
- Strong communication skills, with the ability to clearly explain technical issues to both technical and non technical audiences
- Experience with documentation and knowledge management (e.g., runbooks, playbooks, reusable solutions)
- Demonstrated ability to improve processes through automation, standardization, and self service
- Exposure to SDLC and Agile environments, including supporting deployments and operational readiness
Preferred Qualifications
- ITIL 4 knowledge or ITSM certification (ITIL preferred)
- Experience implementing service operations automation and self service capabilities
- Experience with monitoring and reporting tools (e.g., dashboards, alerting systems) in enterprise environments
- Salesforce experience is considered an asset
- People first leadership focused on trust, growth, and accountability
- Strong operational mindset with attention to detail and service quality
- Data driven decision making approach
- Ability to balance short term operational demands with long term improvements
- Composed and structured approach in high pressure situations
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