Business Systems Lead

Our Client

They are going through a period of significant change. In 2024 they will embark on a company-wide Digital Transformation (“DX”) Programme, which will result in a complete change to their technology stack. Their IT and Portfolio Delivery teams will be at the centre of this DX programme and so now is a unique and exciting time to join their business and play a key role in the successful delivery of their programme objectives.

Through exposure to their DX programme, it is expected that all their IT and Portfolio Delivery roles will have the opportunity to gain new skills and experiences vital to a successful career in the modern workplace. They are investing in the people and technologies that will truly drive their business forward in the coming years and they think this represents a fantastic opportunity for those who choose to join them.

The Role

• You will lead the Business Systems team to support their existing applications estate and play a vital role as part of their largest ever investment programme to ensure successful transition to modern SaaS platforms by building the knowledge and skills within the team to effectively support the new platforms.
• You will support the deployment of an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system across their Sales, Service, Order Management and Finance and Operations (incl Supply-Chain, Warehousing and Logistics) functions by upskilling resources, putting in place proper governance, processes and controls to enable secure, reliable, scalable and effective applications, application support and continuous improvement.
• Reporting to the Head of Systems Operations you will have a strong background in the support and implementation of critical business applications such as ERP and Operations-related solutions on Cloud-based SaaS platforms.
• You will understand the business application requirements (use-cases, processes, regulatory, integrations etc) and play a key supporting role in the development of the plan to deliver aligned to the new system implementation.
• As part of the DX programme team you will partner with colleagues across the business to understand how processes need to fulfil business functions and provide guidance on how to appropriately implement them in the systems.
• You will manage resources who will be significant contributors to the workstreams covering Finance, Commercial, Warehouse Management, Supply-Chain Management, Logistics, Ecommerce, Retail and HR for the DX programme.
• You will plan and manage upskilling resources to effectively support the business through go-live and BAU.
• You will be expected to define and document the Business Systems function approach, environment, requirements, processes and control mechanisms to ensure good governance for their enterprise application and data.
• You will collaborate with enterprise architect resources to apply a holistic view to ensuring their platforms are effectively integrated.
• You will lead the team providing 3rd line support to their Service Delivery team and provide guidance, coaching, assistance and documentation as needed.

Key Behaviours

• Resourcefulness – to fully understand issues to complex business problems, develop solutions and support those solutions to help keep projects and the work of others on track.
• Flexibility – to manage competing priorities effectively, in line with management expectations.
• Excellent communication – ensure the Business Systems team have clear objectives, empowerment and support, and stakeholders are fully updated with plans, status and progress.
• Ownership – to take ownership of assigned plans, activities and issues. Ensure current systems are appropriately maintained and supported. Lead your team to successfully plan, deliver and support solutions.
• Collaboration – to ensure alignment across the IT, vendor and business functions for the successful deployment of the DX programme for your assigned goals, and beyond to BAU and into continuous improvement cycles.
• Proactivity – to identify areas for improvement, challenge requirements when necessary to ensure they are feasible.

Tasks/Responsibilities

Systems

• Lead the team to support their current modern systems (e.g.: D365 CRM), current legacy systems (e.g.: Cameo) and the transition to the DX programme solutions (e.g.: D365 F&O + Supply Chain).
• Use your existing experience with ERPs to understand the required business requirements for the ‘To-be’ platforms and ensure they are implemented effectively.
• Co-ordinate system developments, improvements, upgrades, support and incidents.
• Work with the Portfolio, IT, Implementation partner and Business teams to gather and understand the business requirements, rules and logic and document them to enable effective configuration and development of the ERP solution.
• Co-ordinating within the Portfolio, IT, Implementation partner and Business functions to agree delivery schedules for system configuration, developments and testing, and to deliver on the implementation, user acceptance, transition to support and sign off.
• Be a key member of the DX delivery team, driving the team and wider business to achieve their strategic goals on time and to the agreed cost / quality measures.
• Develop standards, procedures, governance and good practice guidelines to manage the enterprise application estate.
• Utilise the Microsoft DevOps and LCS platforms to manage system environments, upgrades and changes and keep current with the Microsoft management services.
• Create support paths and mechanisms to ensure proper levels of support (per business needs) to cover critical solutions during key trading periods.
• Act as the key interface between their internal delivery teams, their implementation partners and business areas in terms of systems requirements across the programme.
• Acting as a point of escalation on all Business Systems issues.
• Build the Applications roadmap, platform and practices to ensure effective use, support and improvement, meeting required security and regulatory requirements (e.g.: GDPR, J-SOX, PCI).
• Assess, challenge, prioritise, document and deliver business requirements from stakeholders.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to ensure alignment on systems priorities and strategies.
• Help define KPIs and assist/build Dashboards and Auto-reports.
• Other duties as are within the scope and spirit of the job and the title of the position that may arise from time to time or as required by management.

People

• Developing a culture of collaboration and partnering within the team, wider business and third parties, building and maintaining strong relations with key stakeholders across all areas.
• Lead the Business Systems team to ensure proper levels of support to the business and successful transition from legacy systems to D365 ERP and related platforms.
• Manage resources across a matrix-managed environment to ensure prompt delivery spanning development, data migration, conversion, integration, testing, reporting.
• Continually improve the customer service provided to the business, with clear communication and collectively developing business relationships, focusing on common goals.
• Communicating with operational managers and staff in a professional manner at all times.
• Supporting fellow team members at all times, focusing on the success of the team and business.
• Act in a responsible and professional manner.
• Identify training requirements required to fulfil your role and bring them to the attention of your line manager as appropriate.
• Mentoring / coaching users on technical matters to develop understanding where appropriate.
• Providing training and support to users.
• Ensure that team members understand and adhere to company policies and procedures.

Internal Control

• Requirement for weekly reporting to management of status and progress to plan.
• Document and own the business requirements for all elements of the ERP system, promote good data hygiene, security and GDPR practices.
• Ownership of SaaS platform updates and upgrades per Microsoft advised and MTS desired cycles.
• Establish processes by which the health of applications and integrations will be monitored, alerted and supported, ensuring appropriate uptime, performance and effectiveness of systems.
• Assess Internal Controls and implement remediation for significant control deficiencies for the areas of responsibility.
• Ensure documentation of policies and procedures required to support all aspects of data migration are maintained up to date.
• Maintain the company’s records to ensure compliance with the Group’s J-Sox CLC, FRCLC and PLC requirements.
• Ensure relevant policies and procedures are followed to enable compliance with all laws and regulations applicable to the aspects of responsibility under the control of this role.
• Co-ordination and support of internal and external audit activities as required.

Operational Excellence 

• Continually demonstrate professionalism across all areas of the role, as well as interaction with the business and third parties.
• Ensure continual improvement in all aspects of the role.
• Ensure that all company administrative procedures are adhered to.
• Great time-management skills, ensuring that the appropriate responses are made in a timely fashion to requests / instructions from management, the business or the SRI Group.
• Inform management immediately if you become aware of anything suspicious, unusual, or contradictory to normal company process.

Knowledge, Skills & Experience

Essential

• Extensive experience managing technical teams to implement and support enterprise business applications.
• Significant experience implementing ERP solutions with a strong understanding of software development and release lifecycles, integration services tools and techniques.
• Familiar with concepts/approaches to migrate legacy systems to cloud-based SaaS solutions.
• Experience with gathering business requirements and developing plans to deliver them.
• Solid understanding of Business Application platform architectures (e.g.: SaaS, APIs, AIS).
• Ability to translate, and challenge where necessary, complex business requirements into effective processes.
• Ability to create, manage and deliver plans for business requirements across IT teams.
• Ability to upskill team members to proficiency in gathering business requirements and taking on support for new solutions.
• Experience defining and implementing processes to validate outcomes and verify results of system implementations.
• A creative problem solver, you know how to influence stakeholders at all levels to step back, understand the root cause of a problem and develop innovative solutions.
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams, inspiring them to achieve ambitious goals.
• Have excellent communication skills, both written and verbal, and can effectively convey complex technical and business concepts to stakeholders at all levels.
• Thrive in a dynamic and fast-paced environment and can adapt to changing priorities, whilst maintaining focus on the big picture in terms of strategic goals / timescales.
• Are a ‘doer’ and are not afraid to make decisions and take calculated risks to drive the product forward, ensuring that innovation, execution and business value are balanced.

Desirable

• Strong academics (including a related computer science degree).
• Experience with MS D365 Finance and Operations.
• Experience with Supply Chain and Logistics solutions.
• Familiarity with Microsoft cloud SaaS platforms for BI (e.g.: Dataverse), Integration (AIS) and Power Platform/Apps.