Service Support Lead

Service Support Lead – Airline Operations Platform

ROLE OVERVIEW

TEAM

At easyJet, we are transforming Airline Operations through modern product-led technology, operational excellence, automation, data and AI-enabled capabilities.

The Airline Operations Platform is the single point of contact for the applications and source data availability assigned to the Platform, enabling four operational missions across four business critical applications. It owns the crew, flight planning, network control and engineering systems that keep the network flying, AIMS, TOPS, LIDO and AMOS.

The 24x7 Service Support team is the front line of that. It is where the operation comes when something is wrong, and where every request for the Platform arrives. As Service Support Lead, you lead that team and own the experience the operation has of Platform support\: how quickly it is answered, how well it is triaged, how much is resolved at first contact, and how reliably the right expertise arrives when it cannot be.

This role brings together our ICC Tech Support team and our Application Analyst team, enabling first and second level support of our critical applications as one service rather than two. It is a 24x7 team that deeply cares about our Integrated Control Centre, Network Control, HOC and Engineering teams, and about the people in them who are trying to run an airline.

The ICC Tech Support team are the front-facing team into airline operations. They sit closest to the operation, know its rhythms and pressures, and are the first voice the operation hears. Second line application support brings the depth behind them. The two working as one team, with knowledge flowing deliberately from second line into first, and issues fixed first time rather than passed along.

You also own the front door. The Platform is moving from demand arriving ad hoc and invisibly to a single route in that is triaged, sized and prioritised. Holding that discipline, consistently and even under pressure from people who would rather ring someone they know is central to the role.

This role forms part of the Airline Operations Platform leadership team and reports directly to the Head of Technology – Airline Operations Platforms. It works in close partnership with the Platform Lead – Demand & Capability, the Technical Specialists, the Platform Leads, the Service Assurance Specialists, I&O and Major Incident Management, vendors, mission teams and operational leadership across Network Control, Crewing, Ops & ATM and Engineering & Maintenance.

JOB PURPOSE

• Lead the 24x7 Service Support team, owning the quality, responsiveness and reliability of Platform support to the operation.

• Own the shift model and rota, ensuring genuine round-the-clock cover with the right capability on every shift.

• Accountable for triage quality, so demand is understood, categorised, prioritised and routed correctly first time.

• Bring ICC Tech Support and Application Analysts together as a single first and second level support service for the critical applications.

• Own first-line and second-line incident resolution and drive up the proportion of issues fixed first time.

• Drive deliberate knowledge transfer from second line into first line, so the front-facing team can resolve more of what the operation brings them.

• Ensure escalation to application SMEs and vendors is fast, correct and evidenced when it is needed.

• Align Platform support to the ITSO and Major Incident Management process, supporting incidents rather than running parallel ones.

• Own service performance reporting for support\: volumes, response, resolution, MTTR, first-time fix and recurrence.

• Shift work left\: use knowledge, runbooks, automation and self-service to move resolution closer to the point of contact.

• Lead, develop and support a shift-based team through significant organisational change, with genuine care for wellbeing.

• Ensure no application enters supported service without documentation, monitoring, tested cover and a workable support model.

JOB ACCOUNTABILITIES

24x7 Service Operation & Shift Leadership

• Own the 24x7 support operation for the Platform applications, integrations and data flows.

• Own the shift model, rota and staffing plan, ensuring cover is genuine rather than nominal\: every shift has the capability, access and authority to act.

• Own shift handover quality, so context, open issues and operational risk pass between shifts reliably.

• Plan cover around the operational calendar, including peak season, known high-risk periods, major change windows and holiday absence.

• Ensure the team has the tooling, access, monitoring visibility and escalation contacts needed to work effectively at three in the morning as well as at midday.

• Manage the practical realities of shift-based working, fatigue, isolation on nights, escalation confidence and address them actively rather than accepting them.

One Team\: First and Second Level Support

• Run ICC Tech Support and Application Analysts as one service with one set of objectives, not two teams sharing a queue.

• Own the working relationship between first and second level\: shared priorities, shared measures, joint reviews and a shared understanding of what good looks like.

• Drive deliberate, continuous knowledge transfer from second line into first line — shadowing, paired working on live issues, walkthroughs after resolution, and runbooks written by the people who will use them.

• Measure and improve first-time fix\: every issue that first line could reasonably have resolved but escalated is a knowledge gap to close, not a failure of the analyst.

• Protect the ICC Tech Support team's role as the front-facing team into airline operations, and make sure their proximity to the operation is used as an asset rather than treated as a switchboard.

• Ensure second line stays connected to the operation rather than working only through tickets, so their expertise is grounded in operational reality.

• Build cross-skilling in both directions, so the team has depth on nights and weekends as well as during the working day.

• Create the conditions for the two groups to become one team\: shared rituals, mutual respect for what each brings, and honesty about what changes for whom.

Front Door & Triage

• Hold the discipline, courteously but firmly, when people attempt to route work directly to engineers, and redirect it without making it harder for them to get help.

• Own triage quality\: correct categorisation, priority, impact assessment and routing first time, with enough information captured to act on.

• Identify and remove duplicate demand before it is worked twice and identify demand that is already known or already in flight.

• Work with the Platform Lead – Demand & Capability so the single demand register is accurate, current and trusted, and support the daily triage rhythm.

• Feed patterns back into the demand picture\: what is being asked for, by whom, how often, and what it suggests about underlying problems.

Incident Management & Escalation

• Own first-line and second-line incident management for the Platform estate, including diagnosis, restoration and communication.

• Drive up first-time fix and resolution without escalation, so application SMEs are used for genuine third-line work rather than routine questions.

• Own the escalation path to Technical Specialists, Platform Leads and vendors\: fast, correct, evidenced and understood by everyone on shift.

• Align to the ITSO and Major Incident Management process, ensuring Platform supports the major incident rather than running a parallel one.

• Own operational communications during incidents and disruption, so operational users and leadership know what is happening, what the impact is and what to expect next.

• Ensure incident records are accurate and complete enough to support root cause analysis afterwards.

• Escalate early when something is beyond the team's reach and treat late escalation as the failure rather than asking for help.

Service Performance & Reporting

• Own service support performance reporting\: contact and ticket volumes, response and resolution times, MTTR, first-time fix, escalation rates and recurrence.

• Provide reporting that gives operational and Platform leadership a true picture of service health rather than a reassuring one.

• Track and report against the agreed support measures, including front-door compliance, duplicate rate and median time to triage.

• Identify trends and emerging risk from support data and raise them with evidence before they become incidents.

• Support the Service Assurance Specialists and Platform Leads with the support-side evidence behind service reviews, problem management and supplier performance.

Shift-Left, Knowledge & Continuous Improvement

• Own the knowledge position for support\: runbooks, known error records, diagnostic steps and resolution guides that are current, accurate and actually used.

• Shift work left\: take resolution from third line into second line, from second line into first line, and from first line into self-service, working with the Technical Specialists and the Automation capability.

• Ensure runbooks and diagnostic guides are written for and tested by the analysts who will use them at three in the morning, not written for an audience that already knows the answer.

• Identify the repeat contacts, recurring faults and avoidable requests that should be designed out and feed them into problem management and the automation pipeline.

• Support adoption of self-service and automation by the operation and give honest feedback where it is not working for users.

• Contribute to continuous improvement of support process, tooling and practice, and reduce the manual effort inside the support function itself.

• Ensure knowledge transfer from Technical Specialists, vendors and offshore partners actually reaches the support team.

Service Transition & Support Readiness

• Own the support acceptance position\: no application, integration or automation enters supported service without documentation, monitoring, tested cover and a workable support model.

• Hold that gate under delivery pressure and be willing to say that something is not ready to support.

• Own support readiness for applications transitioning into the Platform, including AMOS and the engineering estate, where there is currently no engineering cover in the central model.

• Work with the Delivery Managers, Service Assurance Specialists and QE function on readiness criteria and operational handover.

• Ensure the team is trained and confident on new applications and change before it goes live, not after the first incident.

Supplier & Stakeholder Interaction

• Own day-to-day support-level interaction with vendors, including raising, chasing and escalating incidents through their support processes.

• Hold vendors to their response and resolution commitments, escalating through the Delivery Managers and Supplier Management Specialist where leverage is needed.

• Provide the support-side evidence — recurring faults, response times, quality of vendor resolution — that supports supplier performance conversations.

• Build trusted relationships with operational users and leadership, so support is seen as a route to resolution rather than an obstacle.

• Represent Platform support credibly in operational forums and during disruption, where clarity matters more than detail.

People Leadership & Change

• Line manage, coach and develop the Service Support Analysts and 24x7 Service Support Analysts, setting clear objectives, expectations and performance measures.

• Bring together the ICC Tech Support team and the Application Analyst team into one combined service, with care for the people affected and honesty about what changes for them.

• Recognise and protect what each group brings — operational proximity and pace from ICC Tech Support, application depth from the Application Analysts — rather than levelling one into the other.

• Build a team that visibly cares about the Integrated Control Centre, Network Control, HOC and Engineering teams it serves, and understands the operational consequence of the systems it supports.

• Build capability and confidence across the team, so analysts can resolve more themselves and escalate well when they cannot.

• Reduce single points of failure in support cover through cross-skilling, documentation and named deputies.

• Support recruitment, onboarding and induction, and shorten the time it takes for a new analyst to become genuinely capable.

• Look after the wellbeing of a team working shifts in a high-pressure environment, and act on the causes of pressure rather than only its symptoms.

• Act as a member of the Airline Operations Platform leadership team, contributing to strategy, planning and organisational development.

Product & Platform Ways of Working

• Work within Product and Platform ways of working, treating the missions and operational users as customers of the Platform.

• Contribute the support view to sprint commitments, backlog refinement and the reuse-first challenge in demand reviews.

• Partner with the Platform Leads and Mission Product Managers so support requirements are considered during design rather than after release.

• Champion the shift from firefighting to prevention\: every repeat contact is a problem to eliminate, not a workload to absorb.

COMPETENCIES

Innovation & Change

Improves how support works rather than accepting the volume. Identifies what should be designed out, automated or shifted left, and leads the team through change with clarity.

Business Performance

Understands the commercial realities of easyJet in terms of operating a high-volume, low-cost airline, and the operational cost of delay in restoring a service the network depends on.

Ownership & Delivery

Takes accountability for the service the operation experiences. Owns the outcome of an incident rather than the handoff, and holds the support acceptance gate even when it is unpopular.

Leadership & People Development

Develops a high-performing shift-based team through coaching, clear direction and genuine care. Builds confidence and capability, and creates a culture where escalating early is the right answer.

Supplier & Partner Management

Holds vendors to their support commitments with evidence rather than assertion, and builds working relationships that hold up during disruption.

Building Relationships

Builds trusted relationships with operational users, mission teams, technical specialists and I&O. Stays calm, clear and credible when people are under pressure and frustrated.

Operational Excellence

Understands what it means to support a live 24x7 operation. Balances speed of restoration with correctness, and never underestimates the consequence of a system the network depends on being unavailable.