IT Service Support Manager

Oak Furnitureland Group; Swindon; On-site; GBP 40,000 - 60,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading UK furniture retailer is seeking an IT Service Support Manager to oversee service management at their Swindon office. This role involves leading the Service Desk team, managing incidents, and ensuring effective IT asset management. Applicants should have strong leadership skills, IT service management expertise, and experience in a mixed-OS environment. Retail experience is a plus. The position offers a comprehensive benefits package including employee discounts, life assurance, and holiday leave.

Benefits

Employee discount on products

Life assurance coverage

25 days holiday per year

Additional day off for birthday

4% pension contribution

Employee Assistance Programme

My Rewards Programme

Qualifications

• Experience managing a technical support team in a commercial environment.
• Understanding of IT service management frameworks.
• Track record of maturing service management processes.
• Ability to engage with diverse stakeholders effectively.
• Data-driven approach to performance improvement.
• Experience in a mixed-OS technical environment.
• Retail experience is a significant advantage.

Responsibilities

• Lead the Service Desk Team and foster a culture of service excellence.
• Manage incident management to restore normal service operation quickly.
• Conduct Root Cause Analysis for major incidents.
• Prepare agenda for Change Advisory Board meetings.
• Ensure IT asset management and lifecycle oversight.
• Drive user adoption and training partnerships.

Skills

Proven Leadership

Strong ITSM Expertise

Process-Driven Mindset

Exceptional Communicator

Analytical & Decisive

Technical Acumen

Retail Experience

Tools

Microsoft Azure

SOTI

Google Workspace

Job description

Oak Furnitureland is a beloved British furniture retailer with a passion for helping people create their dream homes. We are committed to providing exceptional quality and stylish furniture at accessible prices. As we continue to grow and evolve, we're seeking a talented and passionate IT Service Support Manager to join our growing IT team. The position is located at our Swindon Head Office and is fully office-based.

As our IT Service Support Manager, you will be at the heart of our technology operations. This isn't just about 'keeping the lights on'; it's about delivering a stable, predictable, and highly effective IT service that empowers every one of our colleagues to succeed. You will lead the Service Support function, owning and maturing the core processes that ensure our technology services are reliable, resilient, and continuously improving. Your leadership will directly impact the experience of our customers and the productivity of our teams across the whole organisation.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead the Service Desk Team: You will manage, mentor, and develop our IT Service Desk team, fostering a culture of exceptional customer service, accountability, and technical excellence. You will drive team performance through key metrics (e.g. first contact resolution rate, ticket aging).
• Champion Service Management Excellence: You will be the owner and evangelist for our core service management processes. Through your team, you will ensure these functions are embedded, governed, and matured across the IT department:
• Incident Management: Oversee the process for restoring normal service operation as quickly as possible following an incident, ensuring your team minimises business impact and provides clear stakeholder communication.
• Problem Management: Drive the team to look beyond immediate fixes by leading Root Cause Analysis (RCA) on major and recurring incidents, identifying and driving the implementation of permanent solutions.
• Change Management: Play a pivotal part in our Change Management process by preparing and coordinating the agenda and content for the Change Advisory Board (CAB), ensuring all proposed changes are effectively documented and presented for assessment.
• Release Management: Work collaboratively with our development and infrastructure teams to enable your team to effectively support the planning and scheduling of releases into our live environments.
• Govern Our Technology Assets: You will be accountable for maintaining the definitive record of our IT landscape. Your team will manage and develop our IT service management system, ensuring it is the single source of truth for our IT services and assets, and will oversee the lifecycle of all IT hardware and software.
• Drive User Adoption and Capability: You will be a key driver in ensuring our colleagues get the most from our technology. By analysing trends in service desk requests, you will actively identify training needs and work in close partnership with:
• Our Organisational Development team to facilitate the creation of resources that improve user productivity and confidence with our core systems.
• Our Cyber Security team to champion and support initiatives that foster a culture of high security awareness and protection across the entire business.

Skills & Experience:

• Proven Leadership: Demonstrable experience managing and developing a technical support team within a fast-paced, commercial environment.
• Strong ITSM Expertise: A deep, practical understanding of established IT service management frameworks and principles, and how to apply them pragmatically to deliver business value.
• Process-Driven Mindset: A track record of successfully maturing service management processes (Incident, Problem, Change, etc.) through a team-focused approach.
• Exceptional Communicator: The ability to engage with, and manage the expectations of, a wide range of stakeholders, from end-users to senior business leaders. You can translate technical issues into business impact, and describe highly technical solutions to our internal customers in simple and understandable terms.
• Analytical & Decisive: You use data and KPIs to measure performance and drive continuous service improvement. You are comfortable making critical decisions under pressure, especially during major incidents.
• Technical Acumen: Demonstrable experience overseeing a modern, mixed-OS (Windows 12, macOS, Android) technical environment, with strong administrative knowledge of Microsoft cloud services (Azure, Entra ID, Intune), practical experience with ITSM systems and MDM platforms (SOTI), and a working knowledge of AWS and Google Workspace.
• Retail Experience (Desirable): Experience within a multi-channel retail environment (e-commerce, physical stores) would be a significant advantage, giving you an immediate understanding of our unique challenges and priorities.
• Employee discount: amazing discounts available on all Oak Furnitureland products after successful completion of probation
• Life assurance: free cover of a minimum of two times your annual salary up to the age of 65
• 25 days holiday per year plus bank holidays
• Birthday: an additional day off for you to celebrate your birthday
• Pension: 4% employee contribution matched by the company
• Employee Assistance Programme: gives all employees access to both telephone and face-to-face counselling services
• My Rewards Programme: offers discounts on everything from restaurants and supermarkets, to entertainment and holidays