We are seeking a highly motivated and customer-focused Service Delivery Manager to lead a network project delivery organization supporting LAN, WAN, Operational Technology (OT), network security, and wireless projects. This individual will oversee two Project Delivery Leads and a team of approximately 40 members, with accountability for governance, resource management, and Quality, Cost, and Delivery (QCD) across the project portfolio. The role will serve as a key customer-facing leader, drive the evolution of a scalable service delivery model, and champion continuous improvement (Kaizen), team development, and operational excellence.
Essential Functions:
Description / Essential Functions:
Delivery Organization Management
Manage and run network project delivery as a whole across LAN, WAN, OT (Operational Technology) networks, network security, and wireless, overseeing multiple concurrent projects through the Project Delivery Leads.
Establish delivery governance, including standard processes, stage gates, quality reviews, change control, and reporting cadence.
Plan and allocate resources across the team of approximately 40 members, balancing workload, skills, and priorities across projects.
Monitor portfolio-level KPIs (schedule, cost, quality, utilization, customer satisfaction), identify risks early, and make timely decisions on corrective actions and escalations.
Customer Relationship and Single Point of Contact
Act as the customer's single point of contact together with the Project Delivery Leads, receiving, clarifying, and prioritizing customer requests and direction.
Provide regular reporting to the customer (e.g., weekly status, monthly service reports, and periodic management reviews) on progress, KPIs, risks, and improvement actions.
Handle management-level escalations, negotiate scope, priority, and resource trade-offs, and manage customer expectations.
Build long-term, trusted relationships with customer stakeholders and identify opportunities to expand and improve the services provided.
People Leadership and Partner Management
Lead, coach, and evaluate the two Project Delivery Leads, and oversee the development of approximately 40 team members, including hiring, onboarding, skills development, and succession planning.
Foster a team culture of ownership, teamwork, and continuous learning that supports engagement and retention.
When work is outsourced, select and manage partner companies, including contracts, deliverables, acceptance criteria, and partner QCD.
Financial, Risk, and Compliance Management
Manage the delivery budget, cost, resource utilization, and inputs for billing and forecasting.
Ensure delivery complies with customer security policies, change management processes, and safety requirements, including those of manufacturing / OT environments.
Service Development and Continuous Improvement
Lead the transition from in-house delivery support to a standardized service offering, including defining service scope, service catalog, SLAs/KPIs, operating model, and delivery processes.
Develop and maintain high-quality documentation, such as reports, proposals, process definitions, and templates.
Drive Kaizen activities in delivery processes, tools, and quality standards based on our principles, and standardize lessons learned and best practices across projects.
Competencies
Leadership and accountability: Takes full responsibility for the delivery organization and its results.
Sound judgment: Makes timely, well-reasoned decisions based on facts, priorities, and risk.
Logical thinking: Structures complex problems clearly and drives issues to root-cause resolution.
Communication: Communicates clearly and persuasively with customers, executives, engineers, and partners.
Drive and execution: Moves the organization forward and delivers results through others.
Documentation: Produces clear, accurate, and well-organized reports and documents.
Adaptability and learning agility: Flexibly adapts to and absorbs our culture and ways of working, with genuine interest in Japan or our group.
Kaizen mindset: Constantly questions the current way of working and looks for improvements.
The position supports LAN, WAN, OT, network security, and wireless project delivery and may require work in customer or manufacturing environments based on project needs.
Supervisory Responsibility
This position has supervisory responsibilities, directly managing two Project Delivery Leads and overseeing a delivery team of approximately 40 members.
Requirements
Minimum qualification:
Required Education & Experience:
Bachelor's degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
10+ years of progressive experience in IT infrastructure, network engineering, technical project management, or IT service delivery, including 5+ years in network project delivery.
5+ years of experience leading project management staff or technical delivery teams, including 3+ years leading leads/managers and teams of 20 or more members (direct or indirect).
Working knowledge of network technologies sufficient to lead technical coordination and customer communication, including routing and switching, WAN technologies (MPLS, SD-WAN, VPN), LAN, wireless (Wi-Fi design and site surveys), network security (firewalls, NAC, segmentation, IDMZ), monitoring, and high-availability design.
Solid project management knowledge and experience, including scope, schedule, cost, risk, and change management, with demonstrated success managing multiple concurrent projects or a project portfolio.
Experience establishing capacity management, resource planning, or delivery metrics (e.g., effort tracking, utilization, forecasting).
Experience in a manager-level customer-facing role, including executive reporting, escalation handling, and expectation management.
Experience managing vendors or partner companies, or network integrators.
Excellent communication, judgment, logical thinking, and documentation skills.
Business-level proficiency in written and spoken English.
Flexibility and openness to adapt to our culture and ways of working, and interest in Japan or our group.
Preferred Qualifications:
Experience building or launching managed services, or transitioning project-based work into a service offering (e.g., ITIL service design and transition).
Experience with OT / industrial networks in manufacturing environments, such as plant networks, IT/OT segmentation (Purdue model), ISA/IEC 62443, and industrial protocols.
Certifications such as PMP/PgMP, ITIL 4, CCNP/CCIE, or CISSP.
Experience in the automotive or manufacturing industry, or with Japanese companies.
Knowledge of Lean, or Kaizen methods.
Familiarity with delivery and reporting tools such as ServiceNow, Jira, Microsoft Project, or Power BI.
Position Type/Expected Hours of Work:
Onsite work environment
Contract to Hire position
Occasional travel to customer sites and facilities
