Release Officer - IT

Alshaya

Kuwait

Ref: GP435-5194

Job description / Role

Employment: Full Time

Release Officer - IT - Kuwait

Role Profile: A Release Officer will work with different teams to implement, enforce, and improve release processes for our development, test, and production environments. This person works closely with management and individual contributors to improve software engineering processes and implement best practices associated with continuously building, deploying, and updating software and environments.

Release Officer responsibilities also include building, managing, and communicating a Release Schedule - a coordinated view of all releases. This person works with Program Management to identify and manage dependencies between releases and ensure that all releases are scheduled to avoid conflicts and excessive demands on resources.

Job Responsibilities:

Release Planning (20%)

- Facilitates release planning meetings with key stakeholders to identify proper sequencing of release packages.
- Ensures that issues and risks are identified, understood, and dealt with in a manner that mitigates risk to scope and schedule
- Documents the release recommendation for each release and/or change to production. Includes release scope, schedule, deliverables, and roll back plan.
- Reviews release recommendation with key stakeholders.
- Documents and communicates all changes for a release in release notes which are published to both the internal team and the client.
- Attends change management such as CABs and deployment planning meetings to collect data and information pertaining to the release

Release Management (40%)

- Pursues IT and Project compliance with release acceptance criteria.
- Provides outage information and fills out service level agreement blackout request.
- Coordinates and schedules key change to production activities. This includes the tracking of all elements with team leads as the project moves through testing regions into production. Accommodates a flexible schedule as most releases occur outside of regular business hours.
- Supports release execution by monitoring of each phase of the release. Validates the release as it progresses thru various release gates and test phases, alerts appropriate stakeholders of any errors or issues that need to be addressed.
- Provides release coordination and communication during and after deployment.
- Creates requests for change (RFC to production) and obtains appropriate approvals.
- Facilitates emergency releases from production incident identification to incident closure after release.
- Verifies capture of customer acceptance/signoff on deliverables.

Release Standards and Processes (25%)

- Identifies opportunities to make tactical improvements to the release management process.
- Maintains documentation of all processes.
- Collects feedback from the users of release management standards and identifies the need to modify or retire a standard based on the feedback.
- Integrates the release process with other IT processes including ITSM and Waterfall/Agile processes.
- Works closely with Change and Configuration Management team of the ITSM Unit to stay current on all change, configuration and internal controls standards and processes.

Test Environment Coordination (15%)

- Strictly manages timing and coordination of test runs with competing projects and client stakeholders sharing pre-production test environments.
- Manages overall non-production environment usage, configuration, and scheduling of the different test environments for each release.

Requirements

- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field
- 5-7 years of previous release and/or project management experience, (Solid understanding of project management principles preferred)
- 4-6 years of experience in information systems operations environment in systems analysis or development
- Experience in information systems, operations environment, systems analysis or development
- Experience in release management, change management, software development and documentations
- Formal training in project management practices, devops and agile methodologies
- Ability to coordinate cross-functional work teams toward task completion
- Written and verbal communication skills are a must
- General PC knowledge including Microsoft Office knowledge
- Knowledge of ITIL standards and best practices.

About the Company

As a leading international franchise operator, with nearly 90 of the world’s most recognised brands in its portfolio, Alshaya Group brings great shopping, dining, leisure and hospitality experiences to millions of customers across the Middle East & North Africa, Russia, Turkey, Europe and beyond.

Alshaya Group is a dynamic multinational business and family owned enterprise with a consistent record of growth and innovation. For 35 years, Alshaya has been a pioneering force in brand franchising, using its exceptional knowledge and experience to expand at pace.

Our portfolio of well-loved international brands includes Starbucks, H&M, Mothercare, Debenhams, American Eagle Outfitters, P.F. Chang’s, The Cheesecake Factory, The Body Shop, M.A.C, Victoria’s Secret, Boots, Pottery Barn, KidZania and, coming soon, Hampton by Hilton.

From one retail franchise store opened in Kuwait in 1983, Alshaya Group has consistently grown and diversified and today offers customers an unparalleled choice of brands across multiple sectors; Fashion & Footwear, Health & Beauty, Food, Optics, Pharmacy, Home Furnishings, Leisure & Entertainment, and Hotels. A diverse, skilled team of 53,000 people from 120 nationalities support more than 4,000 stores, cafes, restaurants and leisure destinations, a growing online business and a commitment to delivering great customer experiences.

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