IT Operations Lead – B2B
Up to £70,000 plus great benefits (Work Level 5)
Manchester City Centre (hybrid working)

Please note: This role may occasionally require working outside of normal office hours, including weekends, to assist with major IT incidents and emergencies

We’re looking for an experienced IT Operations Lead to join our wider Digital Technology & Data team  in Manchester, where you’ll be responsible for ensuring great service availability across the systems used by our Business to Business (B2B)  channels, including franchise partners and independent societies. In this role you’ll work in a hybrid way – spending your time working between home, the office, and visiting our food stores across the UK (find out more about our hybrid working policy at colleagues.coop.co.uk/hybrid-working-policy).

As an IT Operations Lead at Co-op, you’ll collaborate with a wide range of internal technical teams and external third-parties and oversee all IT operations activities – supporting the successful rollout of new technology into our franchise stores. We’ll look to you to proactively monitor performance and make sure the live systems and integrations that support our franchise business remain stable, reliable, and compliant; ensuring all technical issues and risks are managed effectively. This is a great opportunity to play a key role in supporting our exciting growth plans; helping us work towards our vision of ‘co-operating to build more value for our member-owners everyday’.

What you’ll do

• Work alongside our Installation, Move, and Change (IMAC) team to roll-out technology systems in our new stores
• Collaborate with colleagues in our Service Delivery teams to keep technology systems running to agreed service levels
• Prioritise operational (maintenance, incident, problem, change, disaster recovery, and risk demand)
• Build and maintain positive relationships with key internal and external partners and conduct service reviews
• Be the key escalation point for operational issues; ensuring service availability, performance, security, risk control and compliance
• Support post-incident reviews and prioritise the resolution of issues with the technology platforms
• Proactively identify potential risks and issues and produce plans to control and mitigate them
• Identify service, technology, and process improvements for product and strategic roadmaps
• Provide out-of-hours support with major IT incidents and emergencies, as required

This role would suit people who have

• Experience in an IT Operations role
• Experience leading the delivery of  high-quality support and operations for business-critical systems and applications
• An ITIL foundation qualification and/or the ability to demonstrate a depth of knowledge across IT service management practices
• Good relationship-building and supplier management skills, with the ability to influence and challenge people inclusively

We know that some people are less likely to apply for a role if they don’t meet all the criteria in the job description. At Co-op, we're committed to building a diverse and inclusive working environment, so if you'd like to apply for this role but your experience doesn't quite meet every point, we'd still encourage you to apply. You may be just the right candidate for the job or other roles we have available.

Why Co-op?

If you’ve got the skills and experience we’re looking for, we can offer you a competitive salary and great benefits package which includes 30% off Co-op branded products in our food stores (as well as other discounts on Co-op products and services). You’ll also get:

• An annual bonus (based on personal and business performance)
• 28 days holiday (rising to 32 with service) plus bank holidays
• A pension with up to 10% employer contributions
• Access to a subsidised onsite gym (at our Manchester HQ)
• Coaching and training to support your career development
• Wagestream – a money management app that gives you access to a percentage of your pay as you earn it
• Grocery Aid – 24/7 access to a range of emotional, financial, and practical support services for you and your family

Building an inclusive work environment

At Co-op, we’re proud to do things a different way. As one of the world’s largest co-operatives, owned by millions of members, community is at the heart of what we do. Since our Co-op was founded in 1844, we’ve had a clear social purpose, and everything we do as a business helps to build a fairer world for our members, customers, colleagues, and communities.

We’re actively building diverse teams and we welcome applications from everyone. If you have a disability, we can make reasonable adjustments to our recruitment process according to your needs. We're also part of the Disability Confident scheme, meaning we'll always offer an interview to disabled candidates who apply through the scheme if they meet the minimum criteria for a job.

We'll ask whether you’d like to be considered under the Disability Confident scheme when you apply.

If we invite you to take part in the recruitment process for any of our jobs, we’ll ask you if you need any reasonable adjustments to enable you to participate.

You can find out more about our recruitment process at jobs.coop.co.uk/apply-process.

You can find out more about the Disability Confident scheme and all our commitments to diversity and inclusion at jobs.coop.co.uk/diversity-inclusion-wellbeing.

As part of your application, you'll need to complete an online assessment. This assessment typically takes between 45-60 minutes. If you're a current Co-op colleague, this does not need to be completed.