Service Desk Lead (Swing Shift)

The Service Desk Shift Lead runs the service desk on an assigned shift and leads the Service Desk to it. Three positions exist — day, swing and night — holding continuous supervised coverage across the 24x7 model and across the regions. The Shift reports to the Manager – IT Service Management (ITSM).
The role sits a level above the Service Desk Associate and carries authority the associate role does not. It manages what happens on the shift: roster readiness and work allocation, queue health and triage quality, SLA attainment, and the standard of customer handling and ticket records. It is the first point of escalation for associates on judgement calls and the senior technical point for escalated incidents.
P1 and P2 incidents are accountability. The Shift Lead declares them against agreed criteria, opens and actively drives the critical incident bridge, convenes the respective subject matter experts and resolver teams, and holds the bridge to restoration rather than merely attending it. Throughout, the role issues stakeholder updates at the cadence defined for the severity, to business stakeholders, IT leadership and affected users. After restoration it drives root cause analysis in close coordination with the SMEs, and tracks corrective and preventive actions through closure.
Continuity across shift boundaries is central to the role. The Shift Lead prepares and delivers a documented handover to the incoming Shift Lead, verifies the handover received at shift start, and works with the other two Shift Leads to keep practice consistent across day, swing and night. Alongside that, the role coaches and develops the associates on the shift through quality review and feedback, and reports shift performance, recurring failure patterns and improvement proposals to the Manager – IT Service Management.

Key Responsibilities / Deliverables:

Shift Leadership and Team Supervision

· Lead the Service Desk Associates rostered to the assigned day, swing or night shift, and set the standard for response, ownership and customer handling on that shift.

· Manage shift readiness: confirm roster coverage and brief the team at shift start on open priority incidents, known issues, planned changes and expected volume.

· Allocate and balance work across the shift, reassigning as volume, skill and urgency require rather than leaving the queue to self-select.

· Set performance expectations, hold regular one-to-ones, and contribute to evaluations, probation reviews and development planning for the associates on the shift.

· Attendance, breaks and leaves within the shift so that coverage is maintained, and escalate resourcing shortfalls to the Manager – IT Service Management in advance.

· Act as the first point of escalation for associates on judgement calls covering priority, escalation and difficult customer handling.

Queue Management, Triage Quality and SLA Performance

· Monitor the incident and request queues continuously through the shift and intervene before SLA breach rather than explaining it afterwards.

· Review triage quality, correcting category, impact and priority where they have been set incorrectly, and coach the associate on the reason.

· Manage ageing, stalled and reopened tickets, and holds owners to the agreed update cadence with users.

· Ensure every ticket carries an accurate record of diagnosis, action taken and user communication before it is closed.

· Own SLA and volume performance for the shift, and account for attainment, breaches and their causes.

P1 and P2 Critical Incident Command, Communication and Root Cause Analysis

· Detect and declare P1 and P2 incidents against agreed severity criteria without waiting for a later shift or a senior manager to confirm and initiate the major incident process immediately.

· Open and actively drive the critical incident bridge: convene the respective subject matter experts and resolver teams, assign roles on the bridge, keep discussion focused on restoration, and hold the bridge to timeboxed checkpoints until service is restored.

· Maintain a single authoritative incident record and timeline throughout, capturing symptoms, impact, actions taken, decisions and their owners as the incident progresses rather than reconstructing them afterwards.

· Issue stakeholder updates at the cadence defined for the severity to business stakeholders, IT leadership, and affected users, and issue a clear restoration and closure communication when service is recovered.

· Escalate to the Manager – IT Service Management in line with the agreed escalation matrix, including invoking vendor severity-1 support where applicable.

· Hand over command of a live P1 or P2 to the incoming Shift Lead through a structured bridge handover, so that command transfers without loss of context or momentum at a shift boundary.

· Drive root cause analysis after restoration in close coordination with the respective SMEs, including evidence collection, timeline validation, contributing factor analysis and agreement of corrective and preventive actions with named owners and dates.

· Chair or contribute to the post-incident review, track RCA actions through closure, and raise problem records and known errors so that the same failure is not paid for twice.

· Maintain P1 and P2 readiness: severity matrix, bridge procedure and etiquette, escalation and contact lists, communication templates and runbooks, and verify them periodically rather than discovering gaps during an incident.

Shift Handover and Service Continuity

· Prepare and deliver a documented handover at the end of each shift to the incoming Shift Lead, covering open and in-progress tickets, active priority incidents, pending actions, risks and agreed next steps.

· Receive and verify the incoming handover at shift start, confirming ownership of every item rather than assuming it.

· Maintain continuity across the day, swing and night shifts so that no incident stalls at a shift boundary and no user repeats information already given.

· Coordinate with the other Shift Leads on recurring issues, staffing pressure and consistency of practice across the three shifts.

· Where a P1 or P2 remains open at shift end, remain engaged until command has been formally accepted by the incoming Shift Lead and stakeholders have been told who now holds it.

Escalated Support and Hands-On Resolution

· Act as the senior technical point on the shift for escalated incidents that associates cannot resolve, resolving directly where practical.

· Retain hands-on capability across the supported end-user estate so that guidance given to associates carries technical credibility.

· Support senior leadership meetings, conferences and high-profile user requests occurring during the shift.

Quality, Coaching and Capability Development

· Conduct regular ticket and call quality reviews, and give specific, constructive feedback to associates.

· Coach triage judgement, customer communication, documentation standards and escalation practice.

· Identify capability gaps on the shift and arrange training, shadowing or knowledge transfer with the Manager – IT Service Management.

· Onboard and induct new associates joining the shift and maintain a current view of skills and cross-cover so that coverage does not depend on one person.

Reporting, Process Compliance and Continuous Improvement

· Produce shift reports covering volume, SLA attainment, priority incidents, staffing and notable events.

· Ensure the shift operates in line with agreed ITSM process and raise process gaps and recurring failure patterns for problem management.

· Contribute shift-level observations and proposals to the continuous service improvement register.

· Maintain shift runbooks, escalation matrices and knowledge articles so that they reflect current practice.

JOB COMPETENCIES (Skills & Abilities)

· Shift leadership: Takes charge of a shift and its people, sets the tone for response and customer handling, and keeps the team working to a common standard without constant direction from above.

· Queue and workload management: Reads a queue at a glance, allocates and rebalances work across skill and urgency, and intervene before a breach rather than reporting one.

· Triage oversight: Recognizes incorrect category, impact or priority quickly, corrects it, and explains the reasoning so the associate sets it correctly next time.

· Critical incident command: Drives a P1 or P2 bridge rather than attending it — convenes the right SMEs, assigns roles, holds the bridge to restoration through timeboxed checkpoints, and does not lose the queue while doing it.

· Stakeholder communication under pressure: Writes and issues clear, accurate updates at the cadence the severity demands, to audiences ranging from affected users to executives, without waiting to be asked for them.

· Root cause discipline: Facilitates RCA with the respective SMEs, holds the analysis to evidence rather than assumption, and converts findings into corrective actions with named owners and dates.

· Escalation judgement: Decides when to escalate, to whom and with what evidence, treating escalation as a deliberate judgement rather than a way of clearing the queue.

· Handover discipline: Structures handover so that ownership of every open item verifies what is received rather than assuming it.

· Coaching and feedback: Gives specific, usable feedback from quality review, and develops associates rather than simply correcting their tickets.

· Customer orientation: Handles each interaction from the user’s point of view, holds the team to courteous and realistic communication, and keeps users informed rather than leaving them to follow up.

· Communication skills: Communicates professionally in English with users, technical colleagues, leadership and writes clearly under time pressure.

· Cross-cultural communication: Communicates clearly with users, accents and levels of technical familiarity, adapting language and pace without losing accuracy.

· Technical credibility: Retains practical command of the supported end-user estate, sufficient to resolve escalated incidents and to be trusted by the associates being led.

· Decision-making under pressure: Makes defensible calls on priority, resourcing and escalation during volume spikes and incidents, with incomplete information.

· Data and reporting literacy: Uses queue, SLA and quality data to explain shift performance, identify patterns and support improvement proposals.

· Flexibility and resilience: Works effectively within a 24x7 operating model, including night working where assigned, weekend and public holiday cover, and demand that arrives without warning.

· Consistency and collaboration: Works with the other Shift Leads so that a user receives the same standard of service at 03:00 as at 15:00.

· Personal accountability: Takes responsibility for the shift’s decisions, actions and outcomes, and works continually towards improved performance.

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS (Knowledge & Experience)

· Bachelor’s degree in computer science or equivalent experience in a related field. (Required)

· 6+ years of experience in a service desk or IT support function, including 3+ years as a shift lead, team lead or senior analyst with day-to-day responsibility for the work of others. (Required)

· Demonstrated experience with an enterprise ITSM tool covering queue management, assignment, SLA and OLA tracking, and operational reporting. (Required)

· Demonstrated experience driving P1 and P2 critical incident bridges as the person running the call, including convening SMEs and resolver teams, maintaining the incident timeline and holding the bridge to restoration. (Required)

· Demonstrated experience issuing executive and end-user incident communications at a defined cadence during a live major incident. (Required)

· Demonstrated experience facilitating root cause analysis with subject matter experts and driving corrective and preventive actions through to closure. (Required)

· Demonstrated experience of structured shift handover within a 24x7 or follow-the-sun support model. (Required)

· Experience supporting geographically distributed users across multiple time zones from an offshore or global capability center. (Required)

· Professional proficiency in spoken and written English, sufficient to lead a shift, support a multi-national user base and communicate with senior stakeholders. (Required)

· Hands-on end-user support and desktop troubleshooting experience sufficient to act as the senior technical escalation point on the shift. (Required)

· Experience conducting ticket or call quality review and giving constructive feedback to colleagues. (Required)

· Willingness and ability to work the assigned day, swing or night shift, including weekend and public holiday coverage. (Required)

· Experience producing service performance reporting on volume, SLA attainment and incident activity. (Required)

· ITIL 4 Foundation certification, or equivalent demonstrated knowledge of incident, request, major incident and problem practice. (Required)

· ITIL 4 Practitioner in Incident Management or Problem Management. (Preferred)

· Experience with rostering, coverage planning or workforce management within a shift-based team. (Preferred)

Disclaimer: This job description indicates in general terms, the type and level of work performed as well as the typical responsibilities of employees in this classification and it may be changed by management at any time. Other duties may also apply. Nothing in this job description changes the at-will employment relationship existing between the Company and its employees.