Doherty Associates
Managed Services Manager
London
Posted 1 day ago
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About Doherty Associates
Doherty Associates (DA) have delivered IT solutions for over 30 years to world-renowned, international clients, primarily within the professional and financial services sectors. We are a Microsoft Solutions Partner with multiple designations, hold a Tier 1 Microsoft CSP relationship, and operate to ISO27001 & ISO9001 standards.
Our services are built on the Microsoft cloud ecosystem and focused on delivering secure, high-quality, outcome-driven solutions for our clients.
Our customers rely on us to bring specialist expertise and innovation across cloud solutions, hybrid working, modern workplace, data and BI, cyber security, governance and compliance. We have built a reputation as a company that keeps its promises and delivers quality.
About the role
The Managed Services Manager is accountable for building and leading a high-performing operation that delivers responsive support, field engineering, infrastructure management and advanced proactive engineering. The role combines service strategy, people leadership, operational control, technical service governance and direct client engagement.
Reporting to the Head of Managed Services and working through the Service Desk and Third-Line Team Leaders while directly managing the Field Engineering team, you will set clear standards, establish strong day-to-day control, and ensure effective ownership of tickets, escalations, planned cadence activities and client improvements. You will be visible and credible with demanding clients, creating confidence through clear communication, disciplined execution and measurable improvement.
Role purpose and outcomes
- Set a clear direction for UK Managed Services that aligns service design, capability and investment with Doherty Associates’ business strategy.
- Create a consistently high-performing, customer-centred team with clear ownership, strong leadership coverage and effective coaching.
- Deliver reliable, responsive support across service desk, on-site field engineering and third-line technical escalation.
- Maintain operational control across ticket flow, priority incidents, aged work, problem themes, service risk and resource capacity.
- Develop the service from reactive support towards proactive management of client environments through standardised, automated and repeatable cadence activities.
- Own trusted operational client relationships and deliver world-class service experience to senior stakeholders with high expectations.
- Drive automation adoption, service standardisation and continual improvement that increase quality, efficiency, resilience and commercial value.
Key responsibilities
Leadership, culture and capability
- Lead approximately 25 staff across the Service Desk, Field Engineering and Third-Line Engineering teams.
- Develop and empower the Service Desk Team Leader and Third-Line Team Leader to control daily operations, priorities, escalations, cadence delivery and team performance.
- Manage the dedicated Field Engineering team
- Set clear expectations for professional behaviour, technical quality, client care, urgency, accountability and ownership.
- Build a coaching-led culture using structured one-to-ones, quality reviews, skills assessments, development plans and regular feedback.
- Own effective recruitment, onboarding, probation, performance management, succession planning and retention across the function.
- Create an inclusive, collaborative environment that encourages knowledge sharing and works seamlessly with the Malaysian operation.
Operational service management
- Own end-to-end performance across incident, request, problem and escalation management, ensuring disciplined triage, prioritisation, communication and resolution.
- Maintain strong daily control of queues, SLAs, aged tickets, reopened tickets, backlogs, major incidents, client escalations and engineer workload.
- Define and own clear escalation paths between first line, second line, field engineering, third line, managed security, projects, vendors and client teams.
- Act as the senior operational escalation point and major incident lead, taking command of complex issues and major incidents through to resolution and lessons learned.
- Own operational change governance for supported client environments, chairing the Change Advisory Board and approving changes within agreed risk thresholds.
- Own the operational interface with the managed security service, ensuring security alerts, incidents and remediation actions are triaged, actioned and closed within agreed timescales.
- Own the planning, preparation and effective completion of field engineering visits, with clear records, handovers and follow-up actions.
- Oversee infrastructure management activities, ensuring routine operational work is scheduled, evidenced, reviewed and completed to standard.
- Use service data to identify recurring issues, failure demand, process weakness and opportunities to improve first-contact resolution and user experience.
- Set the standard for processes, knowledge articles, support documentation, runbooks and client-specific operating procedures, holding teams accountable for keeping them accurate and usable.
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Proactive client cadence and environment improvement
- Own a consistent schedule of proactive service activities across the client base, with clear scope, frequency, evidence, actions and client facing reporting.
- Direct and assure activities including phishing simulations, Microsoft Secure Score assessments, environmental health checks, patch and vulnerability review, technology lifecycle review and recurring risk remediation.
- Turn technical findings into prioritised, client-appropriate improvement plans with clear ownership, target dates, risk context and measurable outcomes.
- Standardise and automate cadence activities so they are repeatable, while keeping them aligned to each client’s contracted service, risk profile and business priorities.
- Drive improvements through to completion with Account Managers, Professional Services and Service Delivery Managers, so they are progressed rather than simply reported.
Client leadership and customer experience
- Own the operational relationship with each client, building trust with operational and senior stakeholders and acting as a highly credible representative of Doherty Associates.
- Communicate proactively during incidents and service issues, providing clear ownership, accurate updates, realistic recovery actions and professional closure.
- Lead the operational content of client service reviews alongside Service Delivery Managers, with insight into support performance, engineering trends, risk, improvement activity and forward priorities.
- Understand demanding client environments and ensure the team adapts communication, urgency and service style without compromising process or quality.
- Own service recovery plans where experience falls below expectation, working with Service Delivery Managers to demonstrate progress through evidence and measurable outcomes.
- Partner with Service Delivery and Account Management to identify service risks, client needs and appropriate value-add opportunities.
- Own the operational onboarding of new clients and services, ensuring transition plans, documentation, monitoring and support readiness are in place before go-live.
- Provide operational input to the design of new and changed services so they can be supported effectively and at scale.
Strategy, performance, governance and continual improvement
- Own the service roadmap for UK Managed Services, setting priorities for capability, tooling, automation and service standards that support Doherty Associates’ growth plans.
- Track developments in Microsoft cloud, security and managed services practice, and turn them into service improvements, new standards and value-adding services for clients.
- Shape the future operating model, including team structure, skills mix, leadership coverage and the balance of work between the UK and Malaysian operations.
- Define, monitor and improve a balanced set of operational and experience measures, including SLA performance, customer satisfaction, backlog health, first-contact resolution, quality, productivity and cadence completion.
- Produce clear management reporting that explains performance, emerging risks, root causes, interventions and expected outcomes.
- Drive structured continual service improvement using trend analysis, problem management, client feedback, quality assurance and post-incident learning.
- Lead the adoption of automation, self-service, AI-enabled workflows and standard operating procedures that reduce avoidable demand and improve consistency.
- Be accountable for compliance with relevant policies and standards, including ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and Cyber Essentials Plus.
- Manage delivery within the agreed Managed Services budget, owning resource planning, cost control and utilisation while protecting service quality.
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Qualification, experience and skills
Essential
- Proven experience at senior manager level leading a multi-disciplinary support or managed services operation through team leaders or managers, ideally within an MSP serving high-expectation clients.
- Demonstrable success in improving team performance, service quality, customer satisfaction and operational control.
- Experience managing Service Desk, field-based support and advanced technical escalation or infrastructure engineering functions.
- Expert knowledge of IT service management, including incident, request, problem, change, major incident, escalation and continual improvement practices, with experience of owning change and major incident governance.
- Confident client-facing communication, with the judgement to engage credibly with both users and senior stakeholders during routine service and high-pressure incidents.
- Ability to interpret service and technical data, identify root causes, prioritise interventions and hold owners accountable for delivery.
- Experience of client onboarding and service transition, and of working closely with managed security or SOC teams.
- Good understanding of Microsoft cloud and modern workplace services, including Microsoft 365 and Azure, sufficient to govern technical work and explain risk and improvement priorities.
- Effective people management experience across recruitment, coaching, development, wellbeing, employee relations and performance management.
- Commercial awareness and the ability to balance client outcomes, quality, capacity, standardisation and cost.
Desirable
- ITIL 4 Managing Professional or Strategic Leader certification (ITIL Foundation as a minimum).
- Experience with PSA, RMM, documentation, endpoint management, security awareness and service reporting platforms.
- Experience designing or operating proactive technical cadence programmes, including Secure Score improvement and phishing simulation activities.
- Knowledge of ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and Cyber Essentials Plus operating environments.
- Experience of automation, self-service or AI-enabled service improvement within managed services.
Professional qualities
- Customer obsessed: sets an exacting standard for professionalism, responsiveness and quality.
- Visible leader: present, approachable and prepared to step into difficult situations while developing others to lead.
- Strategic thinker: sets direction and connects day-to-day delivery to longer-term business goals.
- Accountable: takes ownership, creates clarity and follows actions through to completion.
- Calm under pressure: communicates clearly and makes sound decisions during incidents and escalations.
- Commercially minded: understands how repeatability, automation, utilisation and quality contribute to sustainable value.
- Analytical and improvement focused: converts data and feedback into
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