Senior Specialist, Incident & Problem Management

About the role

• Senior Specialist, Incident & Problem Management
• ServiceNow Support
• US Exempt Regular
• Full time
• Stateside Exempt 3.4

This position is classified as "hybrid" and the work location is Adelphi, Maryland. An on-site presence is expected for meetings, summits, or events, and as needed. In accordance with UMGC Travel policy, you will be responsible for any expenses incurred from traveling, including temporary lodging, to Adelphi or locations within the DMV region.

The Senior Specialist, IT Incident & Problem Management is responsible for leading the design, governance, and continuous improvement of enterprise incident and problem management practices. This role ensures IT service disruptions are rapidly restored and underlying root causes are systematically identified, analyzed, and remediated across infrastructure, cloud, network, security, and application environments.

The Specialist partners closely with engineering, operations, service desk, and architecture teams to improve service reliability, reduce recurring incidents, and strengthen operational resilience across the enterprise.

Duties and Responsibilities

Incident & Problem Management Strategy and Governance.

• Develop and maintain enterprise incident and problem management strategies, standards, governance frameworks, and ITIL-aligned processes to improve service stability, restoration effectiveness, and operational maturity.

Major Incident Management & Service Restoration.

• Lead and coordinate major incident response activities across infrastructure, network, cloud, application, and security domains to ensure rapid service restoration, effective communication, and adherence to service level objectives.

Root Cause Analysis & Problem Resolution.

• Facilitate root cause analysis (RCA) activities, post-incident reviews, problem investigations, and corrective action planning to eliminate recurring issues and improve long-term service reliability.

ITSM Process Design & Optimization.

• Design, implement, and continuously refine incident and problem management workflows, escalation procedures, runbooks, operating procedures, and automation capabilities within ITSM platforms and supporting tools.

Service Reliability & Operational Analytics.

• Analyze incident trends, service disruptions, operational metrics, and reliability indicators to identify systemic risks, reduce MTTR and MTTD, and drive proactive service improvement initiatives.

Cross-Functional Collaboration & Continuous Improvement.

• Partner with service desk, engineering, infrastructure, cybersecurity, architecture, and operations teams to implement permanent fixes, improve resiliency, and ensure integration between incident, problem, change, knowledge, and configuration management practices.
• Other duties as assigned.

Competencies

• Crisis management and composure under pressure
• Analytical thinking and root cause identification
• Operational excellence and process discipline
• Strategic problem-solving
• Communication and stakeholder management
• Decision-making and prioritization
• Collaboration and team coordination
• Continuous improvement mindset
• Attention to detail and accuracy
• Accountability and ownership
• Adaptability and resilience
• Service reliability and customer focus.

Skills

• ITIL Incident and Problem Management
• Major Incident Management (MIM)
• Root Cause Analysis methodologies (5 Whys, Fishbone, Fault Tree Analysis)
• Service Level Management (SLA, OLA, XLA)
• ITSM platforms and workflow design (ServiceNow or equivalent)
• Incident response runbook and playbook development
• Operational reporting, dashboards, and trend analysis
• Monitoring, alerting, and observability integration
• Problem record management and corrective action tracking
• CMDB and service dependency mapping concepts
• Stakeholder communications during critical incidents
• Process automation and workflow optimization
• Change, configuration, and release management integration
• Service reliability and operational resilience practices.

Education & Experience Requirements

Education

• Bachelor's Degree in Information Technology, Information Systems, Computer Science, Cybersecurity, Engineering, or a related field or equivalent combination of education and experience.

Experience

• 5+ years of experience in IT operations, service management, infrastructure support, technical operations, or related disciplines.
• Experience coordinating or managing incident response and/or problem management processes within enterprise IT environments.
• Experience working in ITIL-based service management environments.
• Experience collaborating with cross-functional teams supporting infrastructure, cloud, applications, networking, and security services.

Certifications

• Not required.

Preferred Experience Requirements

Education

• Master's Degree in Information Technology, Information Systems, Computer Science, Cybersecurity, Engineering, or a related discipline.

Experience

• Experience leading enterprise IT incident and problem management programs.
• Experience coordinating major incident response activities in large-scale, complex IT environments.
• Experience supporting multi-domain technology environments including cloud, infrastructure, networking, security, and enterprise applications.
• Experience integrating monitoring, alerting, observability, and ITSM platforms.
• Experience driving operational reliability, service improvement, and resiliency initiatives.
• Experience within higher education or other large enterprise organizations preferred.

Certifications

• ITIL Managing Professional or ITIL Practice Manager certification
• ServiceNow IT Service Management certification
• Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) or operational resilience certifications
• Certified Problem and Change Manager (or equivalent)
• Lean Six Sigma, PMP, or process improvement certificatio n preferred.

All submissions should include a cover letter and resume.

Workplace Accommodations

The University of Maryland Global Campus Global Campus (UMGC) is committed to creating and maintaining a welcoming and inclusive working environment for people of all abilities. UMGC is dedicated to the principle that no qualified individual with a disability shall, based on disability, be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of the University, or be subjected to discrimination.

Benefits Package Highlights

• Generous Time Off: Enjoy 22 days of paid vacation, 15 days of sick leave, 3 personal days, and 16 paid holidays (17 during general election years). For part-time employees, time off rates will be prorated based on the number of hours worked.
• Comprehensive Health Coverage: Access to health care, medical with vision, dental, and prescription plans for both individuals and families, effective from the 1st of the month following your hire date.
• Insurance Options: Term Life Insurance, Accidental Death and Dismemberment Insurance, and Long-Term Disability (LTD) Insurance. Part-time employees working less than 0.5 FTE are not eligible for LTD.
• Flexible Spending Accounts: Available for medical and dependent care expenses.
• Retirement Plans: Choose between the Optional Retirement Program (ORP) or the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System (MSRPS).
• Supplemental Retirement Plans: include 401(k), 403(b), 457(b), and various Roth options. The university does not provide matching funds.
• Tuition Remission: Immediate availability for Regular Exempt Staff. Spouses and dependent children are eligible for undergraduate tuition remission after two years of service. NOTE: For part-time employees (at least 50 percent of the time), tuition remission benefits are prorated.

Hiring Range: $105,000.00 - $125,000.00