Associate Director

Xceedance • Full-time • Gurugram, IN • 2d ago

Role Overview:

We are seeking a senior, strategic, and hands-on Associate Director – Application Production Support to lead large-scale enterprise production support operations across a diverse portfolio of business-critical applications.

This role is accountable for service stability, governance, client satisfaction, and operational excellence. The Associate Director will provide leadership across multi-tier (L1/L2/L3) support teams, drive continuous improvement initiatives, and partner closely with engineering, cloud, and business leadership.

The ideal candidate brings deep expertise in the Microsoft technology stack, Azure cloud services, ITSM/ITIL practices, and has successfully managed client-facing support portfolios at scale.

Key Responsibilities

Strategic & Operational Leadership

Own end-to-end production support delivery for multiple enterprise applications and client accounts.
Define and execute the support strategy aligned with business growth, SLAs, and client expectations.
Establish and govern enterprise-grade support models, escalation frameworks, and operational KPIs.
Act as the senior escalation point for critical (P1/P2) incidents and client concerns.

Service Excellence & Governance

Ensure high availability, performance, reliability, and security of production systems.
Drive proactive monitoring, incident management, problem management, and change governance.
Lead root cause analysis (RCA), trend analysis, and preventive actions to reduce repeat incidents.
Ensure compliance with organizational policies, regulatory standards, and audit requirements.

Client & Stakeholder Management

Build and manage senior client relationships, acting as a trusted advisor for production stability and transformation.
Lead service reviews, operational reporting, and executive-level communication.
Partner with delivery, architecture, cloud, and business teams to ensure seamless support outcomes.

People & Capability Leadership

Lead, mentor, and scale high-performing L1/L2/L3 support teams and team leads.
Drive talent development, performance management, and succession planning.
Foster a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement.

Transformation & Continuous Improvement

Lead initiatives around application modernization, cloud migration, and support transformation.
Drive automation, self-healing, and DevOps-aligned support practices.
Collaborate with Agile and engineering teams to align support with development and release cycles.
Influence tooling enhancements across monitoring, ITSM, and reporting platforms.

Delivery & Management Responsibilities

Oversee risk management and mitigation in collaboration with senior delivery leadership.
Review operational metrics, client dashboards, and executive reports.
Ensure accurate, timely, and innovative reporting across service performance and improvements.
Guide code reviews, release planning support, build planning, and deployment readiness.

Required Skills & Experience

15+ years of overall IT experience, with 8+ years in leadership roles managing enterprise application production support.
Proven experience handling large, complex, client-facing support engagements.
Strong hands-on expertise with:
Microsoft technology stack (.NET, SQL Server, IIS)
Azure services (monitoring, diagnostics, automation, security)
ITSM tools (ServiceNow, BMC Remedy, or equivalent)
Deep understanding of ITIL processes (Incident, Problem, Change, Release).
Experience managing L1, L2, and L3 support teams at scale.
Working knowledge of Agile/DevOps environments.
Experience with application transformation and cloud migration programs.
Strong executive communication, stakeholder engagement, and decision-making abilities.
Ability to lead under pressure and manage business-critical incidents.