Service Manager, Tech Service Management Operations

Purpose & Overall Relevance for the Organization:

The business expects reliable, best‑in‑class Infrastructure and Application support services, strong service management, and effective project delivery.
The Service Manager, Tech Service Management Operations plays a critical role in ensuring the stable and seamless operation of IT services across the assigned adidas markets.

This role is responsible for the day‑to‑day operational stability of IT services, as well as service quality and continuous improvement across Infrastructure, End User Services, and local Applications. The position supports the Japan markets, with a strong focus on service excellence, stakeholder engagement, and cross‑functional collaboration.

The role also leads Major Incident and Security Incident management for Japan, working closely with global teams, domain product owners, business partners, and vendors to ensure timely resolution, risk mitigation, and continuous service improvement.

Key Areas of Responsibility

1. Application Service Management

• Provide service management governance for local applications in the Japan market.

• Partner with Local Application Service Owners to recommend and drive continual improvement initiatives.

• Ensure operational stability, service quality, and lifecycle governance for local applications.

2. Major Incident & Security Incident Management

• Lead and coordinate the resolution of Major Incidents and Security Incidents impacting the Japan market.

• Perform security‑related operational activities as required to mitigate risks and eliminate security threats to local applications.

• Collaborate closely with IT Security teams, global stakeholders, and vendors during incidents and post‑incident reviews.

3. Infrastructure Service Management

• Work closely with Global HQ End User Services teams to deliver world‑class Infrastructure services.

• Primary focus areas include Service Desk and Field Services (Onsite Support), while also supporting other Infrastructure services as required.

• Ensure consistent service quality, performance monitoring, and adherence to agreed service levels across markets.

Key Responsibilities

Service Management

• Drive continual service improvement initiatives in collaboration with Domain Service Owners, strategic vendors, and platform operations teams.

• Contribute to improvement activities such as automation, MTTR reduction, incident prevention, and Shift‑Left initiatives.

• Investigate issues across systems, services, and processes to identify root causes.

• Support the implementation of agreed corrective and preventative actions.

• Monitor service delivery performance and ensure SLA compliance; proactively engage stakeholders when service degradation risks are identified.

If required: Supplier Management

• You could be expected to engage with local vendors to ensure that contractual agreements are compliant, measured and adhered to as well as proposing and tracking vendor performance.

If required:People Management / Resource Management:

• Supports resource planning and have responsibility in recruiting process.

• Recommend and support in allocating the different work to the respective employees considering experience, complexity, workload and organizational efficiency

• Continuously monitors and evaluates team workload and organizational efficiency with the support of Tech systems, data and analysis and team feedback and makes appropriate changes to meet business needs.

• Provides team members/direct reports with clear instruction and targets that are aligned with driving business value and Tech objectives.

Key Relationships:

• Global Infrastructure (Tech Core) Service Owners for service improvements and vendor performance metrics

• External Service Providers – service delivery, performance reviews, and quality improvement initiatives.

• IT Security Teams – security incident response and remediation.

Requisite Education and Experience / Minimum Qualifications:

• Four-year college or university degree or equivalent combination of education and experience.

• Fluent spoken and written Japanese and business level English.

• Minimum 10 years of IT experience.

• At least 5 years of experience in Infrastructure IT services.

• Minimum 3 years of experience in either Infrastructure Operations or Application Operations.

• ServiceNow application or similar tool experiences

• Strong ability to work effectively in multicultural and cross‑regional environments.