Application Support Desk Manager

Salary Package: £50,000 plus large company benefits, a broad flexible benefits scheme, and 2 paid-for volunteering days a year

• Excellent package: solid basic and company benefits

Security clearance or willingness to apply will be required for this role.

Role: Application Support Desk Manager

The Application Support Desk Manager is responsible for leading and developing a team of Application Support Analysts that provide 2nd line support for critical business applications used across the organisation.

The role focuses on ensuring the effective delivery of incident, request, problem and service management processes across a portfolio of applications including:

• ServiceNow
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Project Operations
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement (CE)
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance Operations (FinOps)
• Microsoft Dynamics 365 Human Resources (HR)
• Proprietary on-premise business applications

The Application Support Desk Manager will act as the operational leader for the team, ensuring high levels of customer satisfaction, strong service performance against SLA targets, effective escalation management, and continuous improvement of support processes.

The role serves as the key interface between Service Desk teams, end users, third-line resolver groups, application specialists, development teams, and business stakeholders.

Team Leadership & People Management

• Lead, coach and develop a team of Application Support Analysts.
• Conduct regular one-to-one meetings, performance reviews and personal development planning.
• Foster a customer-focused, collaborative and high-performing team culture.
• Manage team workloads, scheduling and resource allocation.
• Support recruitment, onboarding and training activities.
• Identify skills gaps and implement development plans to increase team capability.

Service Operations Management

• Ensure the effective management of incidents, requests and service issues assigned to the Application Support team.
• Monitor ticket queues and workload distribution to ensure SLA compliance.
• Oversee major application incidents and service disruptions.
• Ensure correct prioritisation, categorisation and escalation of tickets.
• Manage service performance against agreed KPIs and SLAs.
• Act as the escalation point for complex support issues.

Stakeholder & Customer Engagement

• Build strong relationships with business stakeholders and key users.
• Ensure customers receive regular updates and clear communications throughout the incident lifecycle.
• Drive a culture of excellent customer service and responsiveness.
• Represent the Application Support function in operational and service review meetings.
• Manage customer expectations during incidents, outages and service improvements.

Third-Line & Supplier Management

• Coordinate activities between Application Support Analysts and third-line resolver teams.
• Ensure effective handover of incidents requiring specialist investigation.
• Work closely with:
• Functional Consultants
• Application Specialists
• Software Developers
• External Suppliers and Vendors
• Monitor escalated tickets and ensure timely resolution.
• Escalate risks and recurring issues appropriately.

Process Management & Governance

• Ensure support processes align with ITIL best practices.
• Maintain and improve incident, request, problem and change management processes.
• Develop and maintain support documentation, knowledge articles and operational procedures.
• Ensure consistent ticket quality and process adherence across the team.
• Support audit, compliance and governance activities where required.

Continual Service Improvement

• Identify trends in incidents, requests and recurring issues.
• Drive root cause analysis and problem management activities.
• Recommend and implement service improvements to reduce support demand.
• Promote automation and efficiency opportunities where appropriate.
• Produce service reports and improvement plans based on operational metrics.

Service Reporting & Performance Management

• Develop and maintain operational dashboards and service reports.
• Monitor and report on:
• SLA performance
• Ticket volumes
• Customer satisfaction
• Resolution times
• Escalation rates
• Backlog management
• Present service performance and improvement initiatives to management.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

The successful candidate will be measured against:

• SLA achievement levels
• Ticket backlog levels
• Ticket ageing
• Service availability performance
• Knowledge article creation and reuse
• Team engagement and development
• Delivery of continual service improvement initiatives
• Reduction of recurring incidents

Location: Birmingham (SCC operate hybrid working, which comprises of a mix of office and home working)

Contract Type: Permanent

Hours: 9.00 am - 5.30 pm Monday - Friday