Engineering Operations Manager

Job Title

Engineering Operations Manager | Permanent Full Time

Salary

$140k - 170k per annum + superannuation (commensurate with skills and experience)

Reporting Line

Head of Engineering, with a dotted line to the Chief Operating Officer (COO).

Location

This role is based in Adelaide and supports flexible working arrangements, including a hybrid model with the option to work from both the office and home. Regular attendance at our Adelaide CBD office is expected.

Key Purpose

The Engineering Operations Manager provides dedicated people leadership and operational management across Identifly's Service Delivery function. The role is accountable for building and maintaining a high-performing, engaged and appropriately resourced engineering workforce through effective people management, performance accountability, professional development and workforce planning.

Reporting to the Head of Engineering, the role provides direct leadership to Identifly's Pod Leads, overseeing workforce planning, performance management, professional development and compliance with operational processes.

Working collaboratively with the Service Delivery team and Leadership Team, the role drives resource optimisation, operational efficiency and alignment with business priorities, allowing the Head of Engineering and Pod Leads to focus on technical direction and client delivery.

About Us

We are a leading implementation partner specialising in Identity and Access Management, Privileged Access Management and Identity Governance. We are a forward-thinking team of cybersecurity professionals driven by the desire to secure all apps and users.

We help businesses secure their environments by using modern tools, expert knowledge and a pragmatic approach.

We are rapidly becoming Australia’s best-known IAM provider and are a trusted partner to our clients in Adelaide and across the country. Our reputation is built on being knowledgeable, highly experienced, effective and reliable.

Our team is everything. Hand-picked, high performing, driven and as smart as they come.

• We have grown rapidly since 2019 and we will continue to attract the A-grade talent we need to grow and be the best.
• We have customised training plans to meet our people’s needs whilst enhancing the capability of our business.
• We have fun and get the job done.
• We mentor and vet our staff to grow them into autonomous stars.

We are always looking for awesome, talented people to join our A-grade team.

About You

You are an experienced and confident people leader from an IT consulting, cyber security or professional services background. You have a proven track record of building, developing and managing high-performing teams, with the ability to drive accountability, engagement and individual performance.

You understand how a billable engineering team runs, and how utilisation, capacity, timesheets and leave affect both delivery and revenue.

You lead leaders. You will manage our Pod Leads and coach them to manage their own teams well, rather than doing it for them. You set clear expectations, hold people to them consistently, recognise strong performance, and address performance and engagement issues early and fairly.

You are data-driven. You build and use dashboards and forecasts to make resourcing decisions, and you can present trends, risks and recommendations clearly to senior leadership.

You have enough technical grounding to understand the work our engineers deliver, assess skills and discuss capability credibly with technical staff. Identity and Access Management experience is highly regarded, but this is not a hands-on engineering role.

You are firm on process and fair with people. You will enforce timesheet, leave and performance processes, and continually look for ways to simplify and automate them.

Communication is key. You will be comfortable holding difficult conversations, negotiating competing priorities with Service Delivery, Pod Leads and the Leadership Team, and reporting clearly to the Head of Engineering and COO.

Key Responsibilities and Outcomes

The Engineering Operations Manager is accountable for the following outcomes:

NB: Please visit: https://www.identifly.com/identifly-careers and navigate to the job description to obtain the full list of actions associated with each outcome.

Outcome 1: Timely and Accurate Timesheet Compliance

Outcome 2: Effective Resource Allocation

Outcome 3: Optimised Resource Utilisation

Outcome 4: Predictable Workforce Capacity

Outcome 5: Effective Leave Management and Coverage

Outcome 6: Consistent People Management and Engagement

Outcome 7: Improved Individual and Team Performance

Outcome 8: Continuous Skills Development and Training.

Team Leadership

As line manager for all Pod Leads, the Engineering Operations Manager is also responsible for:

1. Providing leadership, coaching and mentoring to Pod Leads.
2. Coordinating the recruitment, selection and onboarding of engineering staff, including responsibility for successful employee integration into the Service Delivery team.
3. Managing HR matters as they arise, including employee relations, probation, performance management and offboarding, escalating to the Head of Engineering and COO where required.
4. Contributing to company goals and representing the engineering function in operational planning.
5. Fostering a positive, high-performing team culture that promotes employee engagement, accountability, professional development and retention.

Working Relationships

This role reports to the Head of Engineering, who sets technical direction and engineering priorities, and has a dotted line to the COO for operational reporting and company-wide processes.

The role works closely with Pod Leads, the PMO, Project Managers, sales, technical practice heads and the wider leadership team. The PMO owns project schedules and delivery tracking; the Engineering Operations Manager owns people allocation, availability, capacity and performance. The two roles plan resources jointly.

The Engineering Operations Manager takes ownership of day-to-day people management, workforce administration and operational coordination, minimising administrative demands on Pod Leads and enabling them to focus on technical leadership and client delivery.

Skills and Experience

Experience

• 8+ years in IT, cyber security or technology professional services.
• 3+ years of demonstrated people management experience, including managing team leaders, developing high performing teams and addressing employee performance and engagement.
• Proven experience with resource management, capacity planning and utilisation in a billable consulting or managed services environment.
• Experience running performance management processes, including performance reviews and improvement plans.
• Demonstrated experience managing employee onboarding, professional development plans, training and career progression.
• Experience building and maintaining operational KPI dashboards and reporting.
• Technical background in IT infrastructure, cyber security or Identity and Access Management (highly regarded).
• Experience working within the IAM or cybersecurity industry, particularly in a consulting or professional services environment, in a technical or non-technical management capacity (desirable).
• Working knowledge of Australian employment practices, including the Fair Work Act and leave entitlements (desirable).
• Experience with resource planning, PSA or timesheet tools (desirable).
• Experience with Jira and agile delivery frameworks.

Skills

• Strong people leadership, with the ability to coach leaders.
• Ability to hold difficult conversations and address performance issues early and fairly.
• Proven ability to build high-performing teams, foster employee engagement and retention, and establish a culture of accountability.
• Strong coaching and mentoring skills, with the ability to support individual professional development and career progression.
• Excellent analytical skills, including building dashboards and forecasts in Excel or BI tools such as Power BI.
• Strong planning skills, with the ability to balance competing project demands and resolve resource conflicts.
• A continuous improvement mindset, including standardising processes and automating administration.
• Excellent stakeholder management across engineering, PMO, sales and leadership.
• Strong verbal and written communication, including presenting to senior leadership.
• Excellent personal presentation.
• Excellent time management and prioritisation of tasks.
• Outstanding attention to detail.

Candidate Responses

1. Provide cover letter responding to the following:

a. Summary of how you meet criteria of the role

b. Your people leadership experience, including the size of teams you have managed and whether you have managed team leaders

c. Your experience with resource management and utilisation in a billable services environment.

2. Provide your CV:

a. Outline your leadership and operational management experience

b. Outline any technical background

c. Provide us any additional information that you think will contribute to your success

d. Clearly state your location.

Selection Process

1. Short list applications based on candidate responses and suitability for role

2. Identifly will contact you if you have been shortlisted and arrange a F2F interview

3. F2F interview conducted at Identifly Office, Adelaide CBD

a. Prepare questions about the role (if any)

b. Be prepared to answer questions about your experience, including how you have managed resourcing and performance in a team

c. Be prepared to discuss salary

4. The right candidate: We know when we meet the right person, and we will act quickly to onboard them. Be prepared to be made an offer and provide details of potential start date.