Service Desk Manager

Service Desk Manager

• Salary: National: £43,090 - £46,500. If the successful candidate is a current Civil Servant joining on level transfer, HM Treasury will honour their current substantive salary if higher. This role may be eligible for a Government Digital and Data allowance of up to £13,000. Any allowance is non-contractual and subject to a post-appointment capability assessment, with awards determined by a moderation panel in line with the Government Digital and Data Capability Framework.
• Contract Type: Permanent
• Working Pattern: This post is available on a full time, part time or job share basis, and flexible working hours can be accommodated.
• Location: Darlington (Feethams House) only

Do you want to be part of a friendly and collaborative team and provide overall leadership and management of the Service Desk team, including line management responsibility for Service Desk Analysts. If so, then read on!

About the Team

The Financial Analytics Control and Technology (FACT) team is a friendly and collaborative team that sits within HM Treasury's Public Spending Group and prides itself in developing professional expertise and working collaboratively with its wide range of partners. It provides financial reporting analytics, data management, training, business analysis and service improvement services to wider government. To enable these services the team manages and supports the Online System for Central Accounting and Reporting (OSCAR). OSCAR is an IBM Cognos based, cross-government system which contains a detailed, multi-year analysis of departmental spending and from which the Whole of Governments Accounts (WGA), Supply Estimates and other key outputs are produced. OSCAR's main objectives are to:

• Be the single source for reliable, real time financial information for government.
• Increase our analytics and insight capability to support decision making.
• Enable the modernisation and standardisation of financial accounting and reporting.
• Reduce the time taken to produce statutory publications.
• Be capable of future development and expansion (e.g., to new datasets). FACT comprises around 12 members of staff and provides exposure to colleagues across the breadth of the government finance function. The team fully supports learning, development and growth.

The key responsibilities of the post-holder will be:

OSCAR is His Majesty's Online System for Central Accounting and Reporting. It has 1800 end-users, and they require a proficient service desk facility responsible for prioritising, allocating and resolving all service-related tickets to our other OSCAR suppliers for resolution. This service desk is currently provided by an external service provider, and the post holder would lead the successful transition of that incumbent service to a new in-house team.

This role directs day-to-day functions, making sure users and business teams receive the support required. They deliver excellent customer service and promote user happiness. The role reports to a Senior IT Service Manager and will have line management responsibility of the service desk analysts.

On a typical day you will

Customer Support and Service Delivery

• Lead the delivery of Service Desk operations, ensuring incidents, service requests and changes are managed effectively in line with agreed service management processes and standards.
• Take overall accountability for the Service Desk's performance, ensuring services meet established service level agreements (SLAs), critical metrics, and business requirements.
• Coordinate the management of major incidents, ensuring seamless collaboration among resolver groups and timely communication with collaborators.

Stakeholder and Customer Relationship Management

• Build and maintain strong relationships with stakeholders, customers, suppliers and delivery teams to ensure a high-quality, user-focused service.
• Act as the primary escalation point for high-impact issues, ensuring stakeholders are appropriately engaged and informed throughout.
• Represent the Service Desk in governance forums and senior collaborator discussions, providing clear updates on operational efficiency and issues.

Reporting, Records and Knowledge Management

• Own and ensure the integrity of service management data, including incidents, requests, assets and performance information.
• Use customer feedback, performance data and operational insights to identify service gaps and opportunities for improvement.
• Ensure audit, governance and compliance requirements are met across all Service Desk processes and records.

Leadership, Resourcing and Continuous Improvement

• Provide overall leadership and management of the Service Desk team, including line management responsibility for Service Desk Analysts.
• Handle workforce planning, rota design and resource allocation to ensure effective service coverage and resilience.
• Establish team capability through coaching, mentoring and development, fostering a high-performing and user focused culture.

Service Strategy, Governance and Supplier Management

• Ensure alignment to IT operations frameworks (e.g. ITIL), embedding guideline across incident, problem, change and service management areas.
• Stay informed of industry developments and emerging technologies, finding opportunities to enhance service capability and efficiency.

The role will require technical ability:

• Demonstrable understanding of ITIL practices, including incident, problem, change and service level management
• Strong understanding of IT service delivery frameworks and operating models
• Experience using ITSM tools (e.g. Jira Service Management or similar) to handle service performance and operations
• Understanding of supplier management and multi-team service delivery environments

Qualifications:

1. SIAM Foundation - If you do not hold the qualification, you should be willing to achieve it within 12 months of joining if successful.
2. ITIL v4 (or v5) Foundation - Required on application

About You

We want you to have the ability to deliver a high-quality IT support service by setting clear standards, ensuring accurate prioritisation of working and driving consistent outcomes that meet user and business needs as well as being able to pro-actively identify improvement opportunities. We would like you to be able to demonstrate leadership by setting clear direction and standards for service delivery, supporting colleagues to understand priorities and contribute to share objectives. It's essential that you have experience of leading an IT Service Desk team to deliver a user centric service, focussed on quality and continuous improvement.

Some of the Benefits our people love!

• 25 days annual leave (rising to 30 after 5 years), plus 8 public holidays and the King's birthday (unless you have a legacy arrangement as an existing Civil Servant). Additionally, we operate flexitime systems, allowing employees to take up to an additional 2 days off each month
• Flexible working patterns (part-time, job-share, condensed hours)
• Generous parental and adoption leave packages
• Access to a generous Defined Benefit pension scheme with employer contributions of 28%
• Access to a cycle-to-work salary sacrifice scheme and season ticket advances
• A range of active staff networks, based around interests (e.g. analysts, music society, sports and social club) and diversity

For more information about the role and how to apply, please follow the apply link.