Head of Enterprise Application Services

Alvarez & Marsal; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 230,000 - 270,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare plans

401(k) retirement plan

Paid time off

Discretionary bonus

Job summary

Alvarez & Marsal seeks a senior leader to head Enterprise Application Services, owning a multi-domain portfolio including ERP, HRIS, CRM and risk platforms. You will drive design, run and evolution of this estate, ensuring reliability, integration coherence and strong vendor governance.

You will set the strategic roadmap, partner with global SI teams, and operate with executive presence to align IT with firm growth and operating priorities.

Qualifications

• Multi-domain enterprise application portfolio ownership at scale.
• Global SI partnership experience with managed service and SI partners.
• Architecture mindset: configure-not-customize and avoid over-customization.
• Leads seven or more direct reports across vertical and horizontal leads.
• Modern and secure DevSecOps practices across the app estate.
• Executive presence with ability to engage C-suite on strategy and trade-offs.

Responsibilities

• Owns design, build, run, and evolution of enterprise application portfolio.
• Ensures platform reliability, integration coherence, and vendor partnerships.
• Delivers a strategic roadmap aligning capabilities to firm growth.
• Collaborates with SI partners without dependency, driving accountability.
• Represents the portfolio to finance, HR, legal, marketing, and BU leadership.

Skills

Multi-platform ownership

SI partnership discipline

Architecture instincts

Domain leadership

DevSecOps maturity

Executive presence

Tools

SAP S/4 HANA

Sales Cloud

Marketing Cloud

Workday HCM

Workday Talent

Job description

About Alvarez & Marsal

Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) is a global consulting firm with entrepreneurial, action and results-oriented professionals. We take a hands-on approach to solving our clients' problems and assisting them in reaching their potential. Our culture celebrates independent thinkers and doers who positively impact on our clients and shape our industry. The collaborative environment and engaging work—guided by A&M's core values of Integrity, Quality, Objectivity, Fun, Personal Reward, and Inclusive Diversity - are why our people love working at A&M.

Description

Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) is a global consulting firm with entrepreneurial, action and results-oriented professionals. We take a hands-on approach to solving our clients' problems and assisting them in reaching their potential. Our culture celebrates independent thinkers and doers who positively impact on our clients and shape our industry. The collaborative environment and engaging work—guided by A&M's core values of Integrity, Quality, Objectivity, Fun, Personal Reward, and Inclusive Diversity - are why our people love working at A&M. Technology at A&M is operated as a platform serving the entire firm - corporate functions, business units, and client-facing engagement teams. As the firm has scaled, the Application Services portfolio has grown substantially in surface area, complexity, and business criticality. The firm's enterprise application estate now includes SAP S/4 HANA, in flight third party onshore and offshore managed service), Workday, Salesforce (Sales Cloud and Marketing Cloud), Sales Engagement Tools, Expense, Timekeeping, and a growing portfolio of legal, compliance, and risk-tech platforms. The Head of Enterprise Application Services is a newly created role, established to provide focused leadership over this portfolio.

How You Will Contribute

The Head of Enterprise Application Services owns the design, build, run, and continuous evolution of A&M's enterprise application portfolio. The role is accountable for application platform reliability, integration coherence, vendor and SI partnership effectiveness, and the strategic roadmap that aligns application capabilities to firm growth.

This is a senior leadership role for a candidate who has run a multi-domain application portfolio at scale, who has held a world-class managed-service partner accountable through a major program, and who can deliver alongside System Integration partners without becoming dependent on them.

The role requires equal fluency in technology delivery and stakeholder leadership. A&M's consuming functions: Finance, HR, Legal, Marketing, Growth, and Business Unit leadership - are sophisticated, intellectual users. The Head of Enterprise Application Services is the single accountable executive who translates their requirements into platform direction, while holding the line on configure-not-customize, integration discipline, and standards.

Vertical application domains

• Finance Tech
• People Tech
• Legal Tech
• Compliance & Risk Tech
• CRM Tech
• Business Unit Tech

Horizontal application capabilities

• Integration & APIs
• Custom Development & Low-Code
• Engagement & Workflow

System Integration (SI) and Managed Service Partnerships

Holds third parties accountable and defines performance metrics, governs the relationship, and escalates appropriately.

Architecture and standards

Leverages and refines Firm architecture standards to manage portfolio. Configure-not-customize as default mindset.

BU technology federation

Works through the Practice IT Liaison construct to federate BU-dedicated technology to platform standards while respecting BU autonomy.

Cost and vendor management

Owns the application portfolio total cost of ownership, license optimization, and contract lifecycle for SaaS and SI partners. Partners with the OCIO/TBM function on financial transparency and show back to consuming functions.

Talent leadership

Builds and develops the leadership layer beneath the role.

Reports to

Chief Administrative Officer

Peer pillar leaders

Chief Information Officer (Infrastructure & Operations). Chief Security Officer (Security & Global Security Office). Chief AI Officer (peer platform)

Primary internal stakeholders

CFO, Controller, Chief People Officer, HR leadership, General Counsel, Chief Compliance Officer, Chief Risk Officer, Chief Growth/Pursuit leadership, BU Growth leaders, BU practice leaders, CPMO and Technology Portfolio Leader, Executive Committee members (occasional, for major program review)

Organization scope

Approximately 60+ named application platforms in the firm's portfolio; team size scales with the role over the first 24 months.

Qualifications

Required

• Multi-platform ownership at scale. Has run a multi-domain enterprise application portfolio (ERP, HRIS, CRM, plus legal/risk and engagement platforms) as a single accountable leader, not a federation of separate platforms.
• SI partnership discipline. Has held a global role working with world-class Managed Service and System Integrators accountable through a major program. Knows how to set scope, govern delivery, elevate, and avoid the failure modes of managed-service over-dependency.
• Architecture instincts. Configure-not-customize as a default mindset. Has resisted SI customization pressure before, with results to show for it.
• Domain leadership. Has built and developed a layer of seven or more direct reports across both vertical domain leads and horizontal capability leads. Comfortable with the synthesis role.
• DevSecOps Maturity. Modern and secure delivery practices across the application estate - build, test, deploy-to-staging. Production handoff discipline.
• Executive presence. Comfortable as the application platform's single representative to the C-suite. Carries enterprise-level conversations on strategy, investment, and trade-offs.

Preferred

• PSF / professional services firm experience. Understands the economics, decision rhythms, and stakeholder dynamics of a partner-led firm. Has worked engagement-driven systems (engagement lifecycle, time tracking, billing) and understands why they matter.
• SAP modernization experience. Has lived through an SAP S/4 HANA program on scale, ideally with a global managed-service partner and knows/understands the failure modes.
• Salesforce maturity. Has operated Sales Cloud and Marketing Cloud in production at scale. Comfortable with the configuration vs. customization debate inside Salesforce specifically.
• Workday operational depth. Has run Workday HCM and Talent in production. Understands the post-implementation roadmap.
• DevOps & Governance. Has stood up development shops using SDLC framework and security best practices.
• Global Capability Center experience. Has built application services delivery capability in India or an equivalent GCC location, with senior in-region leadership.

Your journey at A&M

We recognize that our people are the driving force behind our success, which is why we prioritize an employee experience that fosters each person’s unique professional and personal development. Our robust performance development process promotes continuous learning, rewards your contributions, and fosters a culture of meritocracy. With top-notch training and on-the-job learning opportunities, you can acquire new skills and advance your career.

We prioritize your well-being, providing benefits and resources to support you on your personal journey. Our people consistently highlight the growth opportunities, our unique, entrepreneurial culture, and the fun we have together as their favorite aspects of working at A&M. The possibilities are endless for high-performing and passionate professionals.

Regular employees working 30 or more hours per week are also entitled to participate in Alvarez & Marsal Holdings’ fringe benefits consisting of healthcare plans, flexible spending and savings accounts, life, AD&D, and disability coverages at rates determined periodically as well as a 401(k)-retirement savings plan. Provided the eligibility requirements are met, employees will also receive an annual discretionary contribution to their 401(k)-retirement savings plan from Alvarez & Marsal. Additionally, employees are eligible for paid time off including vacation, personal days, seventy-two (72) hours of sick time (prorated for part time employees), ten federal holidays, one floating holiday, and parental leave. The amount of vacation and personal days available varies based on tenure and role type. Click here for more information regarding A&M’s benefits programs.

Thesalaryrange is $230,000-$270,000 annually, dependent on several variables including but not limited to education, experience, skills, and geography. In addition, A&M offers a discretionary bonus program which is based on a number of factors, including individual and firm performance. Please ask your recruiter for details.