Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is one of the largest school districts in the United States, serving over 320,000 students in 600+ schools and employing approximately 40,000 people, most of them teachers. CPS has set ambitious goals to ensure that every student, in every school and every neighborhood, has access to a world-class learning experience that prepares each for success in college, career, and civic life.  In order to fulfill this mission, we make three commitments to our students, their families, and all Chicagoans: academic progress, financial stability, and integrity.  Six core values are embedded within these commitments – student-centered, whole child, equity, academic excellence, community partnership, and continuous learning.

The Office of Information and Technology Services (ITS) works to build the capacity of schools to use information and technology, maintain network infrastructure, security standards, and support other departments to meet district goals. ITS provides innovative technology solutions that improve the quality of education for students, reduce the administrative burden on educators, facilitate parent interaction, increase community engagement, and support CPS’ mission of transparency by focusing on the ease and equity of access to information.

The Director of School Technology Support Shared Services is responsible for the District-wide delivery of school end-user technology support functions. This position will lead a team of field service support vendors in collaboration with union technical coordinators charged with delivering high-quality, cost-effective technology support services for the nation’s fourth-largest school District. Functional responsibilities include field support services for schools, and all supporting service-related applications. The Director of School Technology Support Shared Services will report directly to the Executive Director of School Technology Support and will partner with CPS Principals, Schools, Administrators, Supporting technical staff, and Strategic Technology vendors to define our end-user technology support strategy, key initiatives, adoption methodologies, break-fix service delivery, IT asset management support on lost/stolen devices, IT School audits, and operational support procedures for the previously mentioned service areas.

• Manage a pool of field support vendors that support schools, and collaborate daily with school technical coordinators (TechCos) who report to school Principals.
• Assist the Executive Director, School Technology Support in monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of the end user support strategy and long-term roadmap; making necessary adjustments to optimize customer satisfaction.
• Provide guidance and direction to a team of managers and vendors responsible for the end user support strategy and long-term road map.
• Develop and maintain strong relationships within our technology department and with CPS schools, administrators, and vendors to identify gaps and address gaps, and ensure daily technology service needs are met and issues resolved.
• Effectively manage support vendor partners, including addressing issues/concerns raised by our constituents, utilizing industry-standard key performance indicators to continuously evaluate service levels, and leveraging cost and customer satisfaction metrics to deliver the right services and service levels.
• Develop a high-performing and service-oriented culture within the team, in alignment with the broader technology team goals, and provide opportunities and a framework for team members’ career growth and advancement.
• Maximize recent investments in demand management, portfolio management, mobile device management, and service desk software by operationalizing processes to manage demand and maintain an organization-wide knowledge base
• Assist the Executive Director of School Technology Support in establishing policies and practices to ensure third-party invoices, timesheets, work orders, projects, and random audits are completed to meet CPS’s Office of Ethics and Code of Conduct.
• Create and manage department budget exceeding $15M per year, inclusive of Board Approval Process (BAP) items, personnel, other non-personnel operating, strategic support vendors, staff augmentation contractors, and capital funding.
• Maintain knowledge of emerging technologies and trends in the IT Industry and make recommendations for potential adoption.

Education Required: 

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field from an accredited college or university
• Master’s degree preferred
• Relevant professional certifications/designations such as CompTIA A+, CompTIA Security+, Project Management Professional (PMP), IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) Managing Professional, and expertise in Microsoft, Google, Apple device platforms preferred

Experience Required: 

• Minimum of eight (8) years of relevant professional leadership experience in IT School Technology, IT Service Desk, IT Support Services, or IT Device Deployment, including the following, is required:
  • Minimum of five (5) years of experience leading/managing one or more of the above functions, including experience designing, developing and leading a large (ex: 150 contractors or more, 180 indirect union employees or more) team of employees spanning multiple levels, including contractors, and management-level roles
• Experience in Senior-level IT service management, customer service management, and business functional service desk experience at a large, public or private sector institution similar in size and complexity to Chicago Public Schools, preferred
• Minimum of ten (10) years of the experience above, strongly preferred

Other Requirements: 

• Local and Domestic travel (E.g., traveling to different CPS locations with FSS vendors, contractors, and School TechCos, and vendor support conferences, etc.) required up to 25%.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities: 

• Strong verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to facilitate presentations to technical and non-technical audiences
• High levels of IT expertise, integrity, honesty, credibility, and the courage to make difficult yet necessary decisions
• Ability to work in collaboration with the ITS leadership team to understand and adhere to CPS ITS strategies, standards, and policies
• Ability to develop deep knowledge of the District’s business units and functions, building both horizontal and vertical relationships with business departments and IT leaders that deliver business impact.
• Strong leadership and team building skills, e.g. ability to develop high-performing teams united around a clear vision for serving schools and achieving student success
• Expertise in leadership development; ability to coach managers, shared services vendors, and indirect School TechCos (CTU employees) toward excellence and build the capacity of technical teams
• Ability to contribute to the people priorities and objectives regarding people leader effectiveness, employee engagement, and enabling others to perform.
• Ability to articulate a vision, set high standards, and effectively guide teams and stakeholders in the realization of expectations set
• Effective strategic planning capabilities, including the ability to establish long-term vision and goals, and align/manage activities toward goal fulfillment
• Knowledge of operations, budget/finance, management and organizational development
• Ability to build collaborative relationships with a variety of constituent groups, including external partners, to ensure the entire system operates in the most effective manner possible to support organizational success
• Ability to define problems, analyze data, and outline valid conclusions and action steps
• Capable of following Company policies and practices while representing CPS in an ethical and professional manner in all interactions with employees, governmental agencies, vendors, contractors, suppliers, students, and the Chicago community
• Skilled in the use of Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) and Google Workspace