Simon BOWDEN
Orpington,Kent
Summary
Dynamic client and business focused IT Professional with over 20 years experience in IT Service management, inclusive of Government and Managed Service Providers. Proven skills in stakeholder engagement and project management with focus on Operational support and availability, whilst achieving cost reduction and improved client satisfaction. Key achievements include , overseeing multi-million-pound accounts, whilst driving service innovation aligned with business objectives. Bring a strong ability to navigate complex environments and deliver value, ready to contribute effectively to any client-focused teams.
Overview
22
22
years of professional experience
Work history
Service Design & Transition Manager
OSB Group
Chatham, Kent
2015.05 - 2025.12
- Commenced at OSB Group as a Service Introduction Manager, subsequently progressing to Service Design and Transition Manager in alignment with the new Target Operating Model
- Engaged with stakeholders at all Organisational levels, from project management to departmental heads, to ensure the services required were designed and transitioned into formal operation, ensuring they are fit for purpose and usability by providing:
- Integrity and availability embedded into the delivery or change of a service prior to its launch
- A universally quality assured and scalable process applicable to all projects irrespective of complexity.
- Operational readiness preparation, guaranteeing necessary governance and artefacts to safeguard live services and business environments.
- Assurance through active engagement, negotiation and collaboration with technology support teams to empower them in supporting the new or changed service throughout its operational lifecycle.
- Fulfilment of the framework ensuring seamless accountability from the delivery team to the IT operational support teams.
- Facilitated easy access to critical information required by IT Operational teams to operated and support new or modified services.
- Assurances to executive sponsors & change management that all the necessary documentation has been acquired and training requirements met to ensure operational support is clearly defined from go live.
- Provide formal validation and certification to the project manager evidencing that the Criteria has been met at each stage of the delivery to ensure both the integrity and availability are incorporated into the service delivery or change prior to its launch.
- Implemented new systems and procedures, resulting in improved workflow efficiency.
- Conducted thorough reviews post-transition to identify areas for improvement in future projects.
- Trained team members on new procedures after system upgrades or changes, promoting swift adoption and minimal downtime.
- Prepared detailed reports post-transition highlighting successes and challenges encountered along the way as lessons for future similar undertakings.
- Coordinated cross-functional teams, ensuring effective communication during transitions.
- Led successful mergers and acquisitions, achieving seamless integration of operations.
- Streamlined transition processes by implementing comprehensive management strategies.
- Enhanced operational productivity with proactive transition management.
- Developed transition plans to align with company's long-term goals.
- Liaised effectively with stakeholders throughout the entire process of transition planning and execution.
- Oversaw major project transitions for minimising disruption to services.
- Managed resources efficiently throughout the transition process, optimising cost-effectiveness without compromising quality of output or service delivery standards.
- Identified potential risks in transition projects for timely mitigation.
- Mediated between conflicting interests during transitions, achieving consensus among all parties involved.
- Maintained positive relationships with external partners during transitional phases, preserving key alliances crucial to business success post-changeover.
Principal Service Consultant
CACI Ltd
London, London
2014.09 - 2018.12
- Joined the organisation as a Service Management Consultant, tasked with designing and implementing a new service offering for the company as a fully managed service provider.
- Successfully integrated numerous organisations into the service offering inclusive but not limited to Leisure, Sports, Charity and a significant amount of Public Sector Clients.
- Defined and assumed responsibility for fit-for-purpose, end-to end service models aligned to best practice (ITIL, SIAM/DIAM).
- Guaranteed service solutions are operable, recoverable and maintainable, by service operations, whilst being transitioned into operational service.
- Acting as primary point of contact for all services being transitioned into operations, coordinating all activities for a seamless service.
- Ensured that SLA's and KPI's were met, through diligent monitoring, data collection and validation of contractual obligations.
- Created reporting metrics to support SLA's and KPI's, ensuring they are succinct and transparent, whilst providing value to both the Clients and Organisation.
- Defined and implemented service improvements based on insights derived from service metrics, enabling the minimisation of service disruption and SLA reaches through proactive alerting.
- Established and implemented a standard operating model "Service Run", to ensure successful service lifecycle management in line with client contractual obligations.
- Maintained the knowledge base as required, whilst communicating service availability metrics to both internal and external stakeholders.
- Managed clients relationships regarding their cloud-based solutions and escalated issues escalated issues appropriately for end user computing clients, including operating systems and service repositories like sharepoint an Wikis.
- Collaborate with project teams to ensure clear definition of operations acceptance from the onset to guide successful service transitions.
- Safeguarded operations/production by ensuring that existing services were not negatively impacted by project releases.
- Propelled early project engagement, fostering collaboration between various teams and operations SME's including third party suppliers.
- Collaborated with the release and change mangers to ensure transition and implementation plans aligned with overall release calendars.
- Negotiated warranty support arrangements with projects that met operational standards.
- Served as the Subject Matter Expert for the Service Transition Process, providing support and guidance to projects for successful service transitions into production.
- Cultivated and maintained relationships with Project & Programme managers and service operations to influence decisions regarding new or changed service implementations.
Service Delivery Manager / Vendor Manager
Ministry of Justice
London, City of London
2011.09 - 2014.08
- Oversaw and account with financial responsibility of circa £15m
- Achieved success in reducing costs and maximising value from budgets through strategic negotiations with suppliers.
- Engaged in numerous agile projects during this tenure.
- Implemented Digital working within county courts for Justice while also focusing on replatforming cruitical business applications for the OPG, which included a subset of brojects within the programme.
- Negotiated service contracts to ensure they met business requirements.
- Facilitated communication between suppliers and the organisation, supporting stakeholder management for service-related matters concerning outsourced services.
- Collaborated on cross functional vendor management activities within the MoJ ICT and its vendors.
- Analysed and categorised vendors during strategic reviews of vendor performance to enhance approaches.
- Chaired regular performance and progress review meetings with incumbent vendors, ensuring quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis to monitor vendor performance against agreed service levels.
- Negotiated contract extensions and terminations based on business needs and vendor performance
- Engaged in relationship building, negotiation and influence with vendors.
- Planned and organised training workshops regarding vendor management preferred toolsets.
- Contributed to both commercial and business requirements, identifying and resolving conflicts to inform commercially viable decisions.
Client Service Manager
Steria Ltd
London, City of London
2010.11 - 2011.05
- Employed within the government sector of the organisation as a Client Service Manager.
- Ensuring third-party suppliers could in business effectively align themselves with ongoing changes in business objectives and strategies throughout a transformation programme.
- Oversaw successful handover of infrastructure delivery areas of the programme into operational support from the project delivery team, ensuring that acceptance criteria was comprehensively documented for supporting teams.
- Reduced service credits significantly during my tenure with the business.
- Activating continuous improvements aligned with the client and business objectives.
- Ensuring that support teams were engaged in supported the ITIL Framework methodology aligning services and process in reduction of costs through ongoing assessments and recommendations assessing and scoping service readiness activities in collaboration with various stakeholders and lead authorities.
- Accountable for maintaining operational risks and issues and registered dependencies until successful completion.
- Facilitation of organisational changes to ensure services could be fully supported in live.
Wintel Delivery Manager
Capgemini UK Plc
London, London
2003.07 - 2010.05
- Wintel delivery manager for substantial multi £M account for the public service.
- Managed all aspects of a large, geographically dispersed ICT Environment, with over 2500 servers and more than 40,000 users across one of Europe's largest Wide Area Networks.
- Oversaw suppliers and and support engineers for corporate services, inclusive of telephony services.
- Designed and implemented services ensuring the sustainable support of the new environment.
Education
O Levels - IT Service Management
College of Lincolnshire
LincolnshireSkills
- ITIL V4 Managing Professional
- ITIL V3 Service Management
- Prince 2 Project Management
- ISO27001:2013 Lead Auditor
- Service Integration and Management (SIAM)
- Digital Integration and Management (DIAM)
- Service Design & Transition
- Continual Service Improvement
- Vendor & Supplier Management
Timeline
Service Design & Transition Manager
OSB Group
2015.05 - 2025.12
Principal Service Consultant
CACI Ltd
2014.09 - 2018.12
Service Delivery Manager / Vendor Manager
Ministry of Justice
2011.09 - 2014.08
Client Service Manager
Steria Ltd
2010.11 - 2011.05
Wintel Delivery Manager
Capgemini UK Plc
2003.07 - 2010.05
O Levels - IT Service Management
College of Lincolnshire