Environment & Release Manager

Job Description:

Position Overview:

We are seeking a highly skilled, organized, and proactive Technical Environment Manager to lead the management and coordination of multiple complex technical environments supporting a large-scale investment management technology transformation within an OCIO framework.

This critical role ensures the delivery of stable, scalable, secure, and compliant environments that enable the design, development, testing, and deployment of strategic investment management applications and platforms. The ideal candidate will possess deep technical expertise, strong stakeholder management capabilities, and a thorough understanding of investment business processes and regulatory requirements.

The successful candidate will have a strong foundation in the Investment Management domain, with specific expertise in data management, investment trading, and reporting systems. The role requires close collaboration with business users, stakeholders, and customers shared services technology teams to ensure the successful delivery of application architecture that supports investment strategies and operational efficiency.

Key Responsibilities:

Environment Oversight and Management:

• Lead the management and oversight of diverse technical environments (development, integration, testing, staging, production, disaster recovery) supporting investment management workflows within an OCIO context.
• Ensure environments are stable, scalable, secure, and compliant with industry regulations
• Manage multiple technology stacks and software platforms, ensuring seamless interoperability, data integrity, and high availability.
• Participate in strategic planning for environment delivery aligned with project phases, business priorities, and risk management objectives.

Technology Infrastructure and Platform Coordination:

• Collaborate with internal architecture and engineering teams, as well as third-party vendors, to design, implement, and maintain infrastructure supporting investment data ingestion, processing, analytics, and portfolio management.
• Oversee deployment, configuration, and integration of key investment management platforms, including proprietary systems and third-party solutions such as State Street Alpha, FactSet, and Jacobi.
• Develop and maintain monitoring and support capabilities to proactively address environment health, capacity, and security issues.

Third-Party Vendor and Service Provider Management:

• Manage relationships with critical technology partners and vendors, ensuring service level agreements (SLAs) are met and vendor performance aligns with business needs.
• Coordinate vendor activities including software upgrades, patches, and support escalations to minimize disruption.
• Participate in contract negotiations, risk assessments, and vendor performance reviews in collaboration with procurement and legal teams.

Risk, Compliance, and Security:

• Ensure all environments comply with relevant regulatory requirements and internal policies related to data privacy, security, and operational risk.
• Work closely with cybersecurity teams to implement controls and monitor for vulnerabilities specific to investment management platforms.
• Contribute to incident response planning and root cause analysis for environment-related issues impacting investment operations.

Process Improvement and Automation:

• Drive continuous improvement initiatives to optimize environment performance, reduce manual effort, and enhance automation in provisioning, deployment, and monitoring processes.
• Develop and maintain comprehensive documentation, environment standards, and best practices tailored to the investment management domain.

Stakeholder Collaboration and Communication:

• Act as a key liaison between investment business groups, internal IT teams, and external vendors to facilitate effective communication and collaboration.
• Provide regular updates and reporting on environment status, risks, and improvement initiatives to senior management and stakeholders.
• Manage environment-related risks and issues, escalating as necessary to ensure timely resolution.

Qualifications:

• Proven experience managing complex technical environments in large-scale IT landscapes, including internal and SaaS applications supporting investment management or financial services.
• Strong understanding of the software development lifecycle (SDLC), testing processes, and environment provisioning tools.
• Deep knowledge of investment management business processes
• Experience working with diverse technology stacks and integrating multiple platforms in a financial services context.
• Excellent communication, stakeholder management, and leadership skills.
• Ability to coordinate multiple projects and priorities in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.
• Strong problem-solving skills, attention to detail, and a proactive approach to risk management.

Preferred:

• Experience working in Agile, DevOps, or Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) environments.
• Familiarity with ITIL or other IT service management frameworks.
• Knowledge of cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and automation tools for environment provisioning and monitoring.
• Prior experience in an OCIO or investment consulting environment is highly desirable.