Application Support Team Leader

Purpose of the role

An opportunity has arisen for an Application Support Team Leader to be responsible for the Application Support team at AJ Bell.  Reporting into the Application Support Manager, the role will be responsible for establishing and improving the processes and behaviours to continue to develop the team into a mature Application Support function, ensuring that there is a consistently good quality local IT support service for colleagues based at our London office, and manage system improvement activities and upgrades related to the share-dealing solution.

What does the job involve?

• Line Management, including mentoring and coaching of the support team members
• Attendance and input into Change Meetings. Taking ownership of changes raised within the team.
• Ensuring consistent achievement of Incident and Service Request SLAs
• Oversight and delivery of Service Improvement initiatives
• Serving as an escalation point for operational colleagues within the Manchester office
• Involvement in management of application and hosting suppliers
• Owning Problem Management and root cause analysis within the application support team.
• Management of Major Incidents and the associated actions, within your area.
• Management of the application environments in line with proposed changes
• Manage updates and change releases in support of business and supplier requirements
• Ownership and delivery of small IT improvement and upgrade projects
• Establishing and maintaining strong relationships with internal stakeholders.

Competence, Knowledge and Skills

Competence

• Excellent personal management and organisation skills
• Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written
• An analytical mind-set and technical ability
• Ambitious and driven to exceed expectations
• Self-starting and able to work on own initiative
• Ability to communicate at all levels, building positive relationships with colleagues and clients and maintaining excellent customer service skills.
• Credible and professional
• Able to challenge appropriately and present solutions
• A high attention to detail

Knowledge & Skills

• Extensive knowledge and experience of Windows or Linux Server administration including troubleshooting. Some competence with the other.
• Knowledge of the Financial Services Industry would be an advantage but not a pre-requisite
• Line Management experience.

• Experience working within a Change and Release framework
• Major Incident Management
• Knowledge of a database language, SQL, MySQL, MongoDb etc.
• ITIL Certified or a technical IT certification would be desirable but not essential
• Project delivery experience

About us:

AJ Bell is one of the fastest-growing investment platform businesses in the UK offering an award-winning range of solutions that caters for everyone, from professional financial advisers to DIY investors with little to no experience. We have over 644,000 customers using our award-winning platform propositions to manage assets totalling more than £103.3 billion. Our customers trust us with their investments, and by continuously striving to make investing easier, we aim to help even more people take control of their financial futures.

Having listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange in December 2018, AJ Bell is now a FTSE 250 company.

Headquartered in Manchester with offices in central London and Bristol, we now have over 1,500 employees and have been named one of the UK's 'Best 100 Companies to Work For’ for six consecutive years and in 2024 named a Great Place to Work.

At AJ Bell you can expect a friendly working environment with a strong sense of teamwork, we have a great sense of pride in what we do, and this is reflected in our guiding principles.

What we offer:

• Starting holiday entitlement of 26, increasing up to 31 days with length of service and a holiday buy and sell scheme
• A choice of pension schemes with matched contributions up to 7%
• Discretionary bonus scheme
• Annual free share awards scheme
• Buy As You Earn (BAYE) Scheme
• Health Cash Plan – provided by Simply Health
• Discounted private healthcare scheme and dental plan
• Free onsite gym
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Bike loan scheme
• Sick pay+ pledge
• Enhanced maternity, paternity, and shared parental leave
• Loans for travel season tickets
• Death in service scheme
• Paid time off for volunteer work
• Charitable giving opportunities through salary sacrifice
• Calendar of social events, including monthly payday drinks, annual Christmas party, summer party and much more
• Personal development programmes built around you and your career goals, including access to personal skills workshops
• Ongoing technical training
• Professional qualification support
• Talent development programmes
• Peer recognition scheme, with rewards including restaurant and shopping vouchers or time off
• Monthly leadership breakfasts and lunches
• Casual dress code
• Access to a range of benefits from our sponsorship deals

Hybrid working:

At AJ Bell, our people are the heart of our culture. We believe in building strong connections by working together. That's why we offer a hybrid working model, where you’ll spend a minimum of 50% of your working time per month in the Manchester office. For new team members, an initial period will be full-time in the office to help you immerse yourself in our business and build valuable relationships with your colleagues.

AJ Bell is committed to providing an environment of mutual respect where equal employment opportunities are available to all applicants and all employees are empowered to bring their whole self to work.

We do not discriminate on the basis of race, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, pregnancy, religion, physical and mental disability, marital status and any other characteristics protected by the Equality Act 2010. All decisions to hire are based on qualifications, merit and business need.

If you like the sound of the above, or just want to know more about the company and the role, we'd love to speak to you.