Senior Application Manager

Kennesaw State University; Kennesaw (GA); On-site; USD 110,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia, is seeking a Senior Application Manager to lead enterprise application services, ensure security, and drive IT initiatives across academic and business units. This role partners with vendors, reviews contracts, and develops operating standards to maintain high availability and performance.

Qualifications include a Bachelor's degree and at least five years of progressive IT experience; advanced degrees and higher-education experience are preferred.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent required.
• Five years of related IT experience with progression.
• Experience working with academic or large organizations preferred.

Responsibilities

• Execute full lifecycle of complex enterprise app services with focus on quality and security.
• Manage relationships with university departments to understand needs and implement solutions.
• Provide advanced technical guidance and troubleshoot data issues with vendors and teams.
• Lead feasibility studies, vendor contracts, and procurement processes.
• Develop best practices for monitoring and ensuring uptime and availability.
• Manage vendor relationships to maximize value from products and agreements.
• Lead department projects and communicate progress and risks.
• Develop SOPs and act as escalation point.
• Maintain app inventories and documentation (architecture, data flow, config).
• Keep stakeholders informed about updates and outages.
• Train and mentor staff as assigned.

Skills

Communication

Leadership

Project management

Customer service

Documentation

Education

Bachelor's degree or equivalent

Advanced degree preferred

Job description

Job Title: Senior Application Manager

Location: Kennesaw, Georgia

Regular/Temporary: Regular

Full/Part Time: Full-Time

Job ID: 300943

About Us

Are you ready to transform lives through academic excellence, innovative research, strong community partnerships and economic opportunity?Do you want to cultivate an inclusive environment that encourages free expression and civil discourse? Kennesaw State University is one of the 50 largest public institutions in the country. With growing enrollment and global reach, we continue to expand our institutional influence and prominence beyond the state of Georgia. We offer more than 190 undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degrees to empower over 50,000 students to become thought leaders, lifelong learners, and informed global citizens. Our entrepreneurial spirit, high-impact research, and Division I athletics draw students from throughout the region and from more than 100 countries across the globe. Our university's vibrant culture, career opportunities, rich benefits, and values of respect, integrity, collaboration, inclusivity, and accountability make us an employer of choice. We are part of the University System of Georgia. We are searching for talented people to join Kennesaw State University in our vision. Come Take Flight at KSU!

Location

(Primary Location for Job Responsibilities) Our Kennesaw campus is located at 1000 Chastain Road NW, Kennesaw, GA 30144.

Our Marietta campus is located at 1100 South Marietta Parkway, Marietta, GA 30060.

Job Summary

Partners with academic and business units within the University to understand their business needs and identify, implement, and maintain IT solutions that help meet their objectives. Provides expert technical guidance to others within the department and across all application services functions. Leads and develops business relationships and deep expertise in the operations of specific business units, handles the most technically complex applications and initiatives, develops internal operating standards, and provides guidance to team members. Works closely with vendors for issue resolution, oversees quality assurance, oversees application availability and security.

Responsibilities

• Responsible for executing the full lifecycle of complex enterprise application services and solutions, ensuring their quality, reliability, stability, recoverability, and security
• Manages and maintains relationships with key departments throughout the University to identify and understand customer needs, and implement solutions that best support objectives
• Provides advanced technical expertise and works closely with other technical staff, functional teams, and vendors to troubleshoot and resolve application and data issues
• Leads feasibility studies, reviews vendor contracts and SLAs, and leads development of procurement solicitations
• Develops best practices for monitoring and proactively determines resource needs to ensure application up-time and availability
• Manages vendor relationships to maximize the benefits the institution receives from their products, services, and agreements
• Leads implementation projects for the department, provides updates on project progress, and proactively communicates issues that may impact project success
• Develops best practices, develops standard operating procedures, provides guidance, provides technical expertise, and functions as an escalation point for the team
• Develops and maintains application inventories and documentation, such as application architecture diagrams, data flow diagrams, business process documentation, configurations, data governance documents, standard operating procedures, and run books
• Keeps stakeholders informed of all relevant updates (system enhancements, system upgrades, system outages, project updates, etc.) around applications, services, projects, initiatives
• Trains and mentors department staff as assigned

Required Qualifications

Educational Requirements

• Bachelor's from an accredited institution of higher education or an equivalent combination of relevant education and/or experience.

Required Experience

• Five (5) years of related IT experience demonstrating a progression of dealing with increasingly complex systems.

Preferred Qualifications

Preferred Educational Qualifications

• An advanced degree from an accredited institution of higher education in a related field
• A degree from an accredited institution of higher education in Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field is preferred

Preferred Experience

• Previous experience working in Higher Education
• Experience with scripting languages for purposes of automation and integration
• Experience with CSS, HTML and/or JavaScript

Knowledge, Skills, & Abilities

ABILITIES

• Able to troubleshoot complex issues independently to determine root cause while maintaining detailed documentation of the progress through completion
• Able to master new applications, in order to fully utilize their capabilities, including utilizing their scripting and process development logic
• Able to build relationships, elicit and understand customer needs, analyze, understand, and document business processes
• Able to think both tactically and strategically
• Able to function with autonomy, making sound and timely decisions as appropriate, and using good judgement to determine which decisions should be escalated
• Able to anticipate to assess problems, proactively develop appropriate solutions, and communicate risks, benefits, and alternatives
• Able to work well within a team environment
• Able to navigate user interfaces for Windows and Linux operating systems, and knowledge of application installation and packaging systems, debugging and analysis tools, OS and middleware (e.g., IIS, Apache/Tomcat, Nginx) related application dependencies and configurations
• Able to handle multiple tasks or projects at one time meeting assigned deadlines

KNOWLEDGE

• Extensive knowledge and experience supporting the full lifecycle of complex, cloud based, and on-premises applications and solutions
• Demonstrated experience advising and guiding less experienced team members
• Must be well versed in current and emerging technologies, technological trends, and industry best practices for their areas of responsibility
• Experience analyzing business processes and supporting implementations from a technical perspective based on the business requirements
• Experience with relational databases and a basic understanding of SQL

SKILLS

• Strong communication and interpersonal skills with a focus on customer service and the ability to communicate technical concepts to non-technology staff
• Excellent interpersonal, prioritization, initiative, teamwork, problem solving, independent judgment, organization, time management, project management and presentation skills
• Proficient with computer applications and programs associated with the position (i.e., Microsoft Office suite)
• Strong attention to detail and follow up skills
• Strong customer service skills and phone and e‑mail etiquette

USG Core Values

The University System of Georgia is comprised of our 25 institutions of higher education and learning as well as the System Office. Our USG Statement of Core Values are Integrity, Excellence, Accountability, and Respect. These values serve as the foundation for all that we do as an organization, and each USG community member is responsible for demonstrating and upholding these standards. More details on the USG Statement of Core Values and Code of Conduct are available in USG Board Policy 8.2.18.1.2 and can be found on-line at https://www.usg.edu/policymanual/section8/C224/#p8.2.18_personnel_conduct.

Additionally, USG supports Freedom of Expression as stated in Board Policy 6.5 Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom found on-line at https://www.usg.edu/policymanual/section6/C2653.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Kennesaw State University is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. The University is committed to maintaining a fair and respectful environment for living, work and study. To that end, and in accordance with federal and state law, Board of Regents policy, and University policy, the University prohibits harassment of or discrimination against any person because of race, color, sex (including sexual harassment, pregnancy, and medical conditions related to pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, ethnicity or national origin, religion, age, genetic information, disability, or veteran or military status by any member of the KSU Community on campus, in connection with a University program or activity, or in a manner that creates a hostile environment for members of the KSU community. For additional information on this policy, or to file a complaint under the provisions of this policy, students, employees, applicants for employment or admission or other third parties should contact the Office of Institutional Equity at English Building, Suite 225, [e-mail].

Other Information

• This is not a supervisory position.
• This position has financial responsibilities.
• This position will not be required to drive.
• This position does not require a purchasing card (P-Card).
• This position may travel 1% - 24% of the time
• This position does not require security clearance.

Background Check

• Standard Enhanced
• Education

Per the University System of Georgia background check policy, all final candidates will be required to consent to a criminal background investigation. Final candidates may be asked to disclose criminal record history during the initial screening process and prior to a conditional offer of employment. Applicants for positions of trust with screening results which confirm a disqualifying criminal history will be immediately disqualified from employment eligibility.

All applicants are required to include professional references as part of their application process. Some positions may require additional job-based screenings such as motor vehicle report, credit check, pre-employment drug screening and/or verification of academic credentials.

https://www.usg.edu/hr/assets/hr/hrap_manual/HRAP_Background_Investigation_Employment.pdf