Senior Director, Mission Service Delivery
About The Position
As part of the Penn State IT’s Optimized Service Team project, IT is implementing a new operating model designed to enhance service delivery, operational efficiency and collaboration across the university. Penn State is seeking an experienced, strategic, and collaborative leader to serve as the Senior Director, Mission Service Delivery. The Senior Director, Mission Service Delivery provides executive leadership for the operational delivery of enterprise IT services across the Mission portfolio. This role is accountable for leading Service Managers, driving operational excellence, enhancing customer experience, and ensuring the consistent delivery of reliable, secure, and high-quality IT services. The position collaborates closely with the Senior Director overseeing Service Owners, the Service Management Office (SMO), and Capability Team leadership to ensure the effective adoption of enterprise service management practices, alignment between services and capabilities, and successful execution of service roadmaps and operational priorities. This leader is responsible for fostering a service-oriented culture, aligning talent and resources with service needs, and ensuring services deliver measurable value to the University.
Requirements
- Significant progressive leadership experience in information technology, service delivery, IT operations, service management, or a related field.
- Demonstrated experience leading large, complex teams (20+ employees), including managers and cross-functional teams, with accountability for organizational performance, talent development, and operational outcomes in a complex, preferably higher education or similarly decentralized environment.
- Experience overseeing enterprise-scale service delivery, operational performance, and continuous improvement initiatives.
- Experience implementing and advancing IT service management practices, operational governance, and service performance management.
- Proven ability to build relationships, influence decision-making, and collaborate effectively with senior leaders, stakeholders, and technical teams.
- Excellent communication, strategic planning, problem-solving, and organizational leadership skills.
Nice To Haves
- Experience with product management, product-oriented operating models, or leading product and service delivery teams preferred.
Responsibilities
- Lead service delivery operations across the Mission portfolio by providing executive oversight of Service Managers, ensuring consistent operational practices, service performance, accountability, and effective execution of day-to-day IT services.
- Coordinate cross-functional service delivery and workforce planning by partnering across organizational boundaries to align resources, define service team needs, and support staffing strategies that enable reliable and efficient service delivery.
- Lead the implementation and adoption of enterprise service management practices by partnering with the Service Management Office to advance ITSM standards, processes, governance, and continuous improvement initiatives across the Mission portfolio.
- Ensure consistent execution of service management processes throughout the service lifecycle by driving operational discipline and adoption of Incident, Problem, Change, Release, Major Incident, Request, Knowledge, and Service Transition Management practices across service delivery teams.
- Lead customer experience and service adoption initiatives by leveraging stakeholder insights to improve service engagement, increase customer satisfaction, drive adoption, and ensure services deliver measurable business value.
- Oversee service communications and serve as the executive escalation point for critical service issues, ensuring effective stakeholder engagement, coordinated messaging, timely issue resolution, and operational accountability across the Mission portfolio.
Benefits
- Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage
- Robust retirement plans
- Substantial paid time off which includes holidays, vacation and sick time
- Generous 75% tuition discount, available to employees as well as eligible spouses and children
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Senior
