Application Support Manager

Company Description

The British Airways (BA) Delivery team is part of BA Digital within the International Airlines Group (IAG), one of the world’s leading airline groups and owner of some of the biggest brands in the sky.

Our vision is to become the most trusted digital airline. We seek to delight our customers, enable our colleagues, accelerate business performance, increase shareholder value, and protect our business through the innovative and agile use of technology and data.

To harness our full potential across our customer, operational and colleague journeys, as well as our enabling domains, platforms and programmes, we are changing our ways of working and transitioning into a product-led organisation at scale.

Together we are building a better BA (British Airways).

Job Description

As an Application Support Manager, you will be working with our Product teams in one or more of our domains within the BA Digital Delivery Team to bring agile change to life and apply SAFe as an overarching umbrella.

Purpose of the role
The Application Support Manager holds a pivotal role within our organisation, ensuring seamless planning, implementation, and production support. You are entrusted with the accountability of coordinating closely with end-user clients to foster robust relationships, and diligently responding to both critical and routine application support requests. Your role is instrumental in liaising with software vendors and consultants, ensuring that development and support processes are well-coordinated and align with the organisation’s standards and objectives.

The candidate will exhibit a profound understanding of application support dynamics. By interfacing effectively with external vendors, consultants, and internal stakeholders, you ensure that the application environment remains robust, secure, and well-supported. Your role is not merely about managing support operations, but about creating a conducive environment for continuous improvement and collaborative problem-solving, thus contributing significantly to BA Digital's success.

Accountabilities

• Oversee the team responsible for supplying BAU information, guiding the development and implementation of system enhancements and agile delivery regarding production support requests
• Ensure the active inclusion of support and non-functional requirements in epics, determining how capabilities will be supported
• Provide expertise and support in AWS optimisation to enhance cloud-based functionalities
• Lead the provision of configuration and maintenance services for SharePoint online and other systems as indicated
• Define and implement streamlined support processes, operating procedures, and best practices for application management, while ensuring active and effective business ownership of applications
• Manage the liaison required for the progress of business change related to system updates and changes involving the Applications Support team
• Act as a decision-maker on the performance of the Applications Support team and
  recommendations to the IT leadership team for improving the service
• Foster and cultivate relationships with customers and stakeholders, including
  establishing and maintaining a 'community of users' network
• Lead and manage the Applications Support team, ensuring timely communication, efficient resource allocation, and alignment with BA values
• Demonstrate exceptional interpersonal and communication skills, ensuring clear and effective communication across all levels of the organisation, facilitating cross functional collaboration, and building strong relationships with both internal teams and external stakeholders
• Showcase a high degree of emotional intelligence, adapting to different personalities and situations, understanding and valuing diverse perspectives, and promoting a culture of respect and understanding within the team and the broader organisation

We are looking for individuals with ability to provide both a technical and a commercial focus, with the ability to analyse and understand complex business processes, drive change assessment, and
identify opportunities for improvement, simplification, and re-usability.

We are looking for individuals able to navigate through uncertainty, with high agility and adaptability that work smarter not harder.

This role may require some travel and working from multiple sites/locations within UK and
internationally. You must be willing and able to travel to participate in meetings, workshops and other related activities.

Qualifications

• Educated to degree level or equivalent experience
• Recognised Agile qualifications (SAFe)

Skills

• Understanding of a broad range of off-the-shelf (OTS) applications like the Microsoft suite, including D365, MS Teams, SharePoint and Azure DevOps (Kanban) as well as internally built systems in the process of being replaced by OTS where possible
• Sufficient technical ability to understand a board range of legacy technology systems so that incidents and change requests can be described and correctly triaged to the appropriate third level support/development group
• ITIL service management experience and ITIL certification to a minimum of foundation level
• Experience with Windows 7, Windows 10, SCCM, Office 2013/2016, Active Directory, Group Policy, Antivirus, Desktop and Laptop Hardware
• Understanding of the Software Development Life cycle (preferably Agile)
• Dynamic, problem-solving approach coupled with the ability to create a positive working environment
• Fluent written and spoken English

Experience

• Experience managing an IT Support or Application Support team
• Extensive experience in Reporting, Trend Analysis, Problem and Change Management
• Experience training end users and stakeholders on how to use bespoke applications
• Experience in documenting fixes for recurring incidents and requests
• Experience working with 3rd party vendors and suppliers
• Experience of working in digital product and Product teams, exposure to and involvement in SAFe Agile a distinct advantage
• Experience working with and delivering on strict SLAs