Director, Information Technology Service Experience and Support

University of Waterloo • Waterloo, ON

36d

About The Position

The Director, IT Service Experience & Support is a member of the IST executive leadership team accountable to the Chief Information Officer for the strategy, governance, and operational performance of the University’s frontline IT support services. The Director provides institutional leadership for the design, delivery, and continuous improvement of a unified, user-centred support model, ensuring consistent service standards, effective IT service management practices, and seamless end-to-end support experiences across central and distributed IT teams. The role establishes performance expectations, service governance mechanisms, and accountability frameworks that promote transparency, operational excellence, and a cohesive support experience for the campus community. The role ensures transparent visibility into service quality through comprehensive dashboards that make it easy to assess service health and effectiveness, and promotes a culture of accountability, collaboration, and service excellence across a diverse, multi-level team of IT professionals.

Requirements

• University degree (or equivalent experience) in Information Technology, Business Administration, or a related field.
• 10+ years of progressive leadership experience in Information Technology, including responsibility for user-facing support and service delivery functions in complex environments.
• Experience leading service modernization initiatives, such as operating model redesign, ITSM implementation, tool or process consolidation, or governance standardization.
• Experience overseeing institutional IT support operations, including multi-channel intake, escalation, and resolution models.
• Experience implementing and governing IT service management practices at an organizational level (e.g., service catalogue, incident/request management, knowledge management, service performance reviews).
• Experience managing operational budgets, workforce capacity, and performance outcomes within a service delivery environment.
• Strong knowledge of enterprise IT service delivery models and applied IT service management frameworks.
• Ability to design and implement a unified, multi-channel support experience that is user-centred, measurable, and continuously improved.
• Understanding of service governance, performance management, and institutional accountability structures within a complex academic environment.
• Strong capability in defining and monitoring service performance metrics, dashboards, and continuous improvement cycles.
• Applied knowledge of knowledge management practices and service catalogue discipline to improve resolution rates and reduce service fragmentation.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to align distributed teams to shared service standards.
• Demonstrated change leadership capability in environments with distributed authority and varied local practices.
• Sound financial and operational judgment related to service capacity planning and resource stewardship.
• Ability to lead managers and frontline service teams, fostering accountability, collaboration, and service excellence.

Nice To Haves

• Graduate degree is an asset.
• Formal training or demonstrated IT service management and continuous improvement practices is preferred.

Responsibilities

• User experience leadership for IT support
• IT Service Management (ITSM) vision, governance, and institutional standard-setting
• Knowledge management
• Performance accountability, benchmarking and executive reporting
• Cross-campus partnership, federation alignment, and service integration
• Financial and people leadership

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager
• Number of Employees: 501-1,000 employees