It Help Desk Manager

Summary:

The IT Help Desk Manager is responsible for leading the Firm’s technical support teams to provide a gold-standard technology experience for our lawyers, staff, practice groups, and clients.

This role takes lead on the end-to-end design and delivery of IT Help Desk support services to maintain defined service levels and uphold customer expectations for quality.

The combination of technical acumen with a relentless customer focus, communication skills, and a desire to help prevent / resolve issues enables the IT Help Desk Manager to promote a reliable and effective technology experience.

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Works closely with cross functional IT leadership to provide feedback on services, help identify and understand system changes, and to prepare support staff for these changes.
• Measures support teams against defined performance SLAs and proactively leads continuous improvement efforts (in partnership with cross-functional IT stakeholders as appropriate).
• Oversees the Firm’s global IT Help Desk (Level 1) staff to provide timely, accurate, and courteous technology support.
• Works with lawyers, staff, clients, and other departments to provide responsive and customer-oriented service that meets or exceeds expectations.
• Manages 3rd party support vendors to ensure that agreed service levels are being met.
• Actively partners with the Director of Service Management and other cross-functional IT leads to define, implement, measure, and continuously enhance ITSM processes for the IT Help Desk (e.g., Incident, Problem).
• Establishes recurring reporting of the IT Help Desk to monitor performance against pre-defined indicators.
• Collaborates and assists in the review and development of the desktop / laptop standard OS, applications and hardware images.
• Stays abreast of industry trends and best practices for service management.
• Actively works to deploy and promote ITIL best practices.
• Actively works with supervisory leads to monitor and adjust inbound work assignments for handling support requests within established service level agreements.
• Contributes to the design, development, and ongoing support of the IT Service Catalog, along with defined SLAs, owners, and fulfillment processes.
• Conducts quality review procedures to ensure quality services.
• Analyzes Help Desk workflows for trends to identify potential problem areas / improve business processes, and works with supervisory leadership to implement continuous improvement.
• Reviews IT Help Desk training materials created by Training staff and conducts IT Help Desk training at Help Desk meetings.
• Actively informs and co-develops the knowledge base (IT / Firm facing) for the Firm’s technology services.
• Informs the continuous development standards for the IT Help Desk, defining the baseline operating knowledge required for staff (e.g., best practices, technical skills, introduction of new systems, procedures and policies).
• Schedules Help Desk staff shifts to ensure hours of operation are covered, including during emergency office closures such as weather-related events.
• Actively partners with the Director of Service Management and other peer IT functional leadership (e.g., Regional IT Services) to establish a global tiered service model that optimizes IT service resources, drives efficiencies, and delivers a gold-standard experience.

Qualifications:

Education & Credentials

• College degree is strongly preferred, ideally in Computer Science, Information Systems, or a related technical discipline.
• Appropriate technical certification(s) are preferred (e.g., ITIL v4).

Knowledge & Experience

• Demonstrated experience working in a time-sensitive, high-visibility environment.
• Demonstrated experience with ITIL-oriented process design for IT Service Management.
• Experience with current operating systems and ideally applications and technologies common to a Law firm (e.g., Collaboration solutions, Document Management Solutions).
• Demonstrated experience designing, implementing, and continuously refining a global, tiered IT support desk model.
• 7+ years of relevant experience, ideally in a large Law Firm setting, a comparable professional services organization, or a legal information services provider.
• Experience with leading service desk performance indicators and service level standards.
• Experience with leading service desk technology solutions for IT and non-IT users (e.g., ServiceNow).
• Demonstrated experience leading an IT Support team or function.

Skills & Expectations

• Excellent problem solving and debugging skills.
• Strong service orientation, and an understanding of the importance of developing effective working relationships with users and organizational stakeholders of all levels.
• Ability to work as part of a team and lead others.
• Demonstrated ability to serve as a change agent, leading and inspiring others to act, especially under circumstances when change is unpopular.
• Ability to work well under pressure.
• Highly motivated, analytical, organized, and efficient.
• Demonstrated ability to manage a team of information technology specialists in the execution of both project and operational workloads.
• Availability to work before and after business hours and weekends with little or no notice.

Work Conditions

• Based in Washington, D.C.
• As with all positions, it will be required to perform other duties as deemed necessary and assigned.
• Core hours of 9:00 am – 5:30pm, Monday – Friday; hybrid in-office, which will be a combination of on-site, and remote work with occasional on-call availability.

Position requires access to equipment, software, or technology that is subject to U.S. export controls. To be granted access pursuant to US Export Control laws, candidate must be either (a) a United States citizen or national; (b) a person lawfully admitted for permanent residence of the United States (i.e., “Green Card” holder); or (c) an INS approved refugee or asylum holder who has applied for naturalization within six months of the date the individual first became eligible; and if not yet naturalized, is still actively pursuing naturalization if 2 years have passed since the date of application to be granted access pursuant to US Export Control laws. Candidates will be required to submit appropriate documentation to determine whether access can be granted before proceeding further through the application process.

Covington & Burling LLP is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate in any aspect of employment, including hiring, salary, promotion, discipline, termination, and benefits, on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, religion, national origin, gender, gender identity or expression, age, marital status, sexual orientation, family responsibility, disability (including physical handicap), or any other improper criterion.