Service Operations Specialist - 4113

Sept 2017 Branding; Greater London; On-site; GBP 45,000 - 65,000; Full time

Job summary

A financial services company in Greater London is seeking a Service Operations Specialist to provide 2nd line operational support for Linux/UNIX application services. The ideal candidate should have extensive experience with Linux Red Hat servers, automation tools like Ansible, and strong collaboration skills. This role offers an opportunity to work in a dynamic environment with critical production infrastructure.

Qualifications

• Strong experience in Linux Red Hat server administration is essential.
• Automation skills with configuration management tools are required.
• Experience with VMware production environments is a must.

Responsibilities

• Provide 2nd line operational support for Linux/UNIX application services.
• Manage production Linux environments and perform maintenance tasks.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to support end-to-end service.

Skills

Strong system administration experience of Linux Red Hat Server

Automation using configuration management tools (Ansible, Chef, Puppet, Salt Stack)

Supporting production VMware environments

Symantec Veritas Clustering Production Support

Troubleshooting AWS products (e.g., EC2, Lambda)

Collaboration with Engineering and operational support teams

Knowledge of ITIL framework

Strong documentation and technical writing skills

Experience with enterprise monitoring systems

Working with ticket systems such as Service Now

Education

Prior IT operational support experience

Job description

CLS helps clients navigate the changing FX marketplace – reducing risk and creating efficiencies. Our extensive network and deep market intelligence enable CLS specialists to lead the development of standardized solutions to real market problems. Our innovative, forward-looking products make the trading process faster, easier, safer and more cost-effective – empowering our clients’ success.

Service Operations Specialist

Job Purpose

Provide 2nd line production operational support for CLS Linux/UNIX application services, many of which are business critical. You will be required to take ownership of problems through to resolution over a wide variety of systems and technologies and provide remote and on‑site support as part of the on‑call support rota.

Experience

• Must have strong system administration experience of Linux Red Hat Server in a production enterprise environment.
• Experience of automation using configuration management tools like Ansible, Chef, Puppet, Salt Stack.
• Experience of supporting production VMware environments.
• Experience of Symantec Veritas Clustering Production Support.
• Experience of performing diagnostic and troubleshooting of the AWS Product set such as EC2, Lambda, EKS, ECR, WorkSpaces, EBS, EFS, S3, RDS MSSQL, Route 53, VPC, CloudFormation, AWS Connect Direct.
• Ability to collaborate highly effectively with Engineering and other operational support teams to support the end‑to‑end service.
• Knowledge of ITIL framework (understanding of Incident, Problem, Change).
• Strong documentation and technical writing skills.
• Experience of enterprise monitoring systems.
• Strong experience in working with ticket systems such as Service Now and an understanding of priorities and SLA’s.

Operational

• Provide project support for the production Linux environments with Symantec Clustering Technology. Responsibilities include Linux backup/restores, daily checks, maintenance tasks and building new systems and applying service packs. Manage and escalated problems as appropriate.
• Ensure that the BAU service is prioritised and all incidents, problems and service requests are responded to in an efficient manner without negatively impacting SLA’s and reporting metrics in place.
• Investigate defects or problems; work with internal CLS teams and external vendors to identify solutions and support any fixes that are required as part of service improvement.
• Follow the CLS Change Management procedure and other standard practices in installing, configuring and supporting Linux Cluster and Linux Infrastructure and related items in Test and Production environments.
• Upgrade or maintain software at a time when the impact to the business is minimised. Execute the failover for the Linux and application services as required.
• Create, maintain and review operational process and support documentation.
• Perform daily/weekly/quarterly system checks. Ensure any issues identified are tracked and addressed.
• Participate in planned weekend work as required.
• Perform monthly operating system security patching.
• Input into the Linux infrastructure changes at the weekly/daily CAB. Ensure other team’s changes do not have an impact on the delivery of the Linux services. Review and approve changes for the Linux team as required.
• Maintain and troubleshoot backup systems.
• Maintain and support the enterprise production Linux server domain, VMware Virtual Infrastructure environment, datacentre server hardware infrastructure.

Strategic

• Ensure CLS internal systems are managed to the highest standard by following industry best practice.
• Where appropriate, contribute to the development of existing and new IT process and procedures to enhance service transitioning and the service lifecycle.
• Demonstrate good problem management ownership and prevention of SLA breaches under Incident/Problem Management processes.

Leadership

• Through example and behaviour, strive to provide peer leadership to other team members ensuring a level of excellence is achieved in delivering the service.
• For any projects you are working on, be accountable for the successful transition of new IT services into support, meeting the team’s service acceptance criteria.

Success Factors

• Possess a strong service‑oriented mind set who can consistently deliver a high level of service to the business.
• Be able to manage their time effectively and prioritise their own workload in order to meet changing demands from the business.
• Self‑motivated to exceed management expectations and objectives.
• Demonstrate good technical, analytical and problem‑solving skills.
• A high level of presentation and communications skills with the ability to communicate confidently with both business and technical staff at all levels.
• Ability to engage with the business to effectively support the environment with some oversight.

Qualifications / Certifications

§ Prior IT operational support experience across business‑critical production infrastructure support, applications and database services.