IT Service Operations & Management Lead

V.Group; Glasgow; Hybrid; GBP 70,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

V.Group seeks an experienced Service Management professional to mature IT service practices across Service Operations and the wider IT community. You will embed sustainable processes, coach leaders, and drive continual improvement using dashboards and performance data.

Experience with Freshservice is preferred, with ServiceNow or HaloITSM as valuable alternatives. The role emphasizes incident, problem, knowledge, and change governance in a global environment.

Qualifications

• Significant hands-on experience developing and maturing practices within an enterprise ITSM platform.
• Freshservice experience is strongly preferred, with ServiceNow or other large ITSM platform experience also highly relevant.
• Expert practical experience with ITIL-aligned service management practices.
• Proven experience developing and optimising service management practices within an ITSM platform.
• Strong analytical and stakeholder management skills.

Responsibilities

• Develop and mature key service management practices across Service Operations.
• Embed consistent, practical and sustainable ways of working with operational leaders.
• Identify service management gaps and coordinate improvement activity.
• Provide service management expertise and coaching to Service Desk and Operations leadership.
• Promote service ownership, accountability and continual improvement.
• Develop dashboards and reporting to demonstrate progress and identify improvements.

Skills

ITIL

Service Operations

Incident Management

Major Incident

Problem Management

Knowledge Management

Dashboards

Automation & AI

Freshservice

ServiceNow

HaloITSM

Power BI

Tableau

Tools

Freshservice

ServiceNow

HaloITSM

Power BI

Tableau

Job description

Who are V? As a global leader in ship management and marine services, we add value to a vessel’s operations. Operating around the clock and around the world, V. gives every client the quality and efficiency they need in every sector. Covering crew management and recruitment, quality ship management and technical services, together with supporting management and commercial services, V. has an unrivalled industry knowledge with performance assured. Our values, We Care, We Collaborate, We Challenge, We are Consistent, We Commit and Deliver, are at the heart of everything we do and they support our strategy of Investing in Talent. We are always interested in making contact with talented individuals - people who will demonstrate our values and deliver great service, for internal and external stakeholders.

Overall Purpose of The Job

• To support the continued maturity and effectiveness of V.Group's IT service management and operations by developing, embedding, measuring and continuously improving service management practices across the organisation.
• Working within the Service Management Office and alongside Service Operations, the role provides specialist service management expertise, practical guidance and improvement capability to the Service Desk, Operations teams and wider technical community.
• The role is not responsible for the day-to-day management of Service Operations or the Service Desk. Instead, it works in partnership with existing operational leadership to strengthen the practices, processes, tooling, data and governance that underpin effective service delivery.
• A significant focus of the role is establishing meaningful service performance and maturity measures, using dashboards, reporting and operational insight to demonstrate tangible improvement over time and identify where further intervention is required.
• The role will focus particularly on Incident, Major Incident, Request, Problem, Knowledge and Continual Improvement, ensuring these practices are effectively embedded within operational processes and the ITSM platform.

Key Responsibilities and Tasks

Service Management Practice & Operational Enablement

• Develop and mature key service management practices across Service Operations.
• Work with operational leaders to embed consistent, practical and sustainable ways of working.
• Identify service management gaps and coordinate improvement activity.
• Provide service management expertise, guidance and coaching to Service Desk and Operations leadership.
• Promote service ownership, accountability and continual improvement.
• Support the Head of Service Management with the service management maturity roadmap.
• Support the maturity of Incident and Major Incident Management practices.
• Improve standards for prioritisation, categorisation, ownership, escalation and communication.
• Ensure practices are effectively embedded within the ITSM platform.
• Support Major Incident governance and Post-Incident Reviews where required.
• Use incident data to identify recurring issues and improvement opportunities.
• Work in partnership with the Service Desk Lead and operational leadership to improve incident outcomes.

Request Fulfilment & Demand Management

• Support the maturity of Request Fulfilment across Service Operations.
• Improve request models, workflows, categorisation, automation and reporting.
• Use demand data to identify avoidable or inefficient demand.
• Identify opportunities for self-service, automation and knowledge-led support.
• Work with Service and Product Owners to address underlying sources of unnecessary demand.

Problem Management & Continual Improvement

• Develop and embed an effective Problem Management capability.
• Use incident and service data to identify recurring issues and potential problems.
• Support root-cause investigation and corrective actions with technical teams.
• Establish appropriate measures for Problem Management effectiveness.
• Maintain visibility of continual improvement activity and demonstrate measurable benefits.

Service Performance, Metrics & Reporting

• A significant responsibility of the role is to demonstrate tangible progress in service performance and maturity through meaningful data and reporting.
• Develop and maintain a service performance and maturity measurement framework.
• Establish appropriate KPIs, KRIs and operational measures.
• Develop dashboards providing a clear view of service performance and maturity.
• Establish baselines and track improvement over time.
• Report on key measures including:
• Incident and request volumes
• Backlog and ageing
• MTTR / recovery performance
• SLA performance
• Recurring incidents and problems
• Knowledge and self-service effectiveness
• Ensure reporting demonstrates outcomes and improvement rather than activity alone.
• Provide insight that enables operational leaders to identify risks and improve performance.

ITSM Tooling & Process Development

• Act as a key subject matter expert for developing and optimising service management practices within the ITSM platform.
• Design and refine workflows, processes, categorisation, automation, reporting and controls.
• Improve ITSM data quality and operational visibility.
• Work with platform administrators and technical teams to translate service management requirements into effective configuration.
• Identify opportunities to simplify processes and reduce manual activity.
• Support the development of automation, integrations and AI-enabled service management capabilities.
• The successful candidate will have significant hands-on experience developing and maturing practices within an enterprise ITSM platform.
• Freshservice experience is strongly preferred, with ServiceNow or other large ITSM platform experience also highly relevant.

Knowledge Management, Automation & Self-Service

• Develop Knowledge Management as an effective operational capability.
• Improve the creation, maintenance and use of operational knowledge.
• Promote knowledge-led support, self-service and shift-left opportunities.
• Identify opportunities to reduce avoidable Service Desk demand.
• Support AI and automation to improve diagnosis, resolution and customer experience.
• Measure the effectiveness and benefits of these capabilities.

Operational Readiness & Change

• Work with Service Operations, Service Owners, Product Owners and technical teams to ensure new and changed services are operationally ready.
• Ensure appropriate support models, knowledge, monitoring, documentation and escalation arrangements are established.
• Identify operational risks associated with significant changes.
• Support relevant change and operational governance forums.
• Ensure operational lessons inform future service design and change.

Stakeholder Engagement & Service Improvement

• Act as a trusted service management partner to Service Desk, Operations and technical teams.
• Build effective relationships with Service, Product, Engineering, Infrastructure and Security stakeholders.
• Facilitate service reviews, workshops and improvement activity.
• Provide coaching and practical guidance to operational leaders.
• Constructively challenge ineffective or inconsistent practices.
• Support the Head of Service Management in communicating service performance, maturity and improvement to senior stakeholders.

Governance, Assurance & Compliance

• Support effective service management governance and controls.
• Monitor adoption and effectiveness of agreed practices.
• Provide evidence and reporting for audit and assurance activities.
• Ensure service management processes and data are controlled, accurate and traceable.
• Support alignment with relevant V.Group management systems, policies and governance requirements.

Key Interfaces

• Head of Service Management
• Service Management Office
• Service Desk and Service Operations teams
• Operations Team Leaders / Managers
• Service Owners
• Product Owners / Product Managers
• Engineering and Development
• Infrastructure and Security
• Change and Project teams
• Quality, Risk and Compliance
• Office and Vessel Operations
• External suppliers and service providers
• Key business stakeholders
• Minimum 5 years' experience leading IT operational teams, with practical experience running and improving live IT services.
• Proven experience in IT Service Management, Service Operations, Service Desk, Infrastructure or Digital Operations.
• Significant practical experience designing, implementing and maturing ITIL-aligned service management practices.
• Proven experience developing and optimising service management practices within an ITSM platform.
• Expert practical experience with an enterprise ITSM platform, preferably Freshservice, with HaloITSM or ServiceNow also relevant.
• Strong practical experience across Incident, Major Incident, Request, Problem, Knowledge and Continual Improvement.
• Demonstrable experience developing service performance metrics, KPIs, dashboards and reporting.
• Proven ability to demonstrate measurable improvement in service performance and maturity.
• Strong analytical, communication and stakeholder management skills.
• Experience influencing multiple operational and technical teams without direct line-management authority.
• Ability to translate service management principles into practical and sustainable ways of working.
• Advanced ITIL 4 certification or expert-level ITIL experience.
• Extensive Freshservice implementation, configuration and optimisation experience.
• HaloITSM and/or ServiceNow experience.
• Experience developing service maturity frameworks or assessment models.
• Power BI, Tableau or similar reporting experience.
• Experience with Knowledge Management, automation and AI-enabled service management.
• Experience supporting ISO 20000, ISO 27001 or similar management systems.
• Experience within a global, multi-region or geographically distributed IT environment.