Strategic Leader, Tech Operations & Business Applications

Westpac New Zealand Ltd; Auckland; On-site; NZD 220,000 - 340,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

4 weeks holiday + 5 wellbeing days

Additional purchased leave up to 4wks/

Banking benefits & insurance discounts

Superannuation scheme

Growth & internal mobility

Recognition program

Volunteer days

Job summary

Westpac New Zealand Ltd is seeking a strategic technology leader to join our Technology Leadership Team as Head of Technology Operations & Business Applications. You will oversee technology service management, operations, resilience, and the Business Applications portfolio to support critical platforms and customers.

You will partner with executives to shape reliability strategy, drive improvements, and lead high-performing teams across NZ to deliver secure, scalable technology services that

Qualifications

• Significant senior leadership experience in Technology Operations, Infrastructure, Engineering, Service Management, or Enterprise Technology environments.
• Deep expertise in IT Service Management (ITIL), Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), DevOps and operational resilience.
• Proven experience leading large-scale technology operations and mission-critical business services.
• Strong experience with incident management, crisis management, disaster recovery, and technology risk management.
• Demonstrated success leading large, diverse teams through transformational change.
• Exceptional stakeholder management and executive communication skills.
• Experience working in Agile, Lean, product-led, or customer-centric operating models.
• A tertiary qualification in Computer Science, Information Technology, Business or a related discipline, or equivalent industry experience.

Responsibilities

• Develop and execute Westpac NZ's Technology Service Reliability strategy aligned to objectives.
• Drive continuous improvement, automation, operational excellence, and innovation across technology operations.
• Champion service resilience and reliability initiatives to support business continuity and customer outcomes.
• Lead transformation activities that modernise service management capabilities and improve operational performance.
• Lead Technology Service Management: Incident, Problem, Change, Capacity, Asset and Operational Management.
• Ensure technology services meet performance, availability, stability and resilience objectives.
• Drive improvements in service risk management, production support, and operational governance.
• Provide executive leadership and communication during major incidents and critical service events.
• Establish and monitor service metrics, KPIs and operational health indicators.
• Partner across technology teams to improve service reliability, reduce customer impacts, and enhance recovery outcomes.
• Lead the Business Applications portfolio, sponsor roadmaps and technology investment planning.
• Ensure engineering and delivery practices align with enterprise standards and strategy.
• Foster a culture of accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
• Partner with senior leaders and vendors; influence decisions with data-driven insights.

Skills

ITSM ITIL

Site Reliability Engineering

DevOps

Operational resilience

Incident management

Stakeholder management

Change management

Agile / Lean

Leadership

Strategic planning

Education

Computer Science degree

Job description

Westpac New Zealand Ltd is seeking a strategic technology leader to join our Technology Leadership Team as Head of Technology Operations & Business Applications. You will oversee technology service management, operations, resilience, and the Business Applications portfolio to support critical platforms and customers.

You will partner with executives to shape reliability strategy, drive improvements, and lead high-performing teams across NZ to deliver secure, scalable technology services that