IT Release Analyst

About Withers

A law firm focused on people, performance, and collaboration.

For the past 130 years, we have supported some of the world’s most remarkable people and organizations at defining moments in their lives. 40% of our business comes from Europe, 40% from the US and 20% from Asia and we are one profit sharing partnership globally.

We are united in our commitment to integrity, quality and collaboration. We have a culture of high performance and deliver excellent service consistently across the firm. We provide tailored solutions built on trust and partner with our clients to achieve their goals.

Many of our clients are shaping the future and creating solutions to tackle some of the world’s most difficult problems. It makes for a fascinating and challenging practice.

Our role is to get to know each individual client, find out where they want to be, and help them to get there – whether they are building a business, buying a home or protecting and defending their interests.

To meet their unique needs we are exceptionally collaborative, working together across teams and time zones. And we are agile – focusing on strategy rather than rigid ideas and traditional hierarchy.

Join us to be part of a team that is always looking to the future. Where initiative, big ideas and bold moves are always encouraged. Where you can truly be yourself.

What are we looking for?

We are seeking a detail-oriented, proactive and collaborative IT Release Analyst to support the planning, scheduling, coordination and successful delivery of technology releases and implementations across our IT landscape. You will work closely with delivery and technical teams, application and service owners, the Testing team, Change Enablement, the IT Service Delivery team and business stakeholders to ensure that releases are appropriately planned, communicated and implemented smoothly, with minimal disruption and in alignment with ITIL 4 good practice.
Releases can include desktop builds, application updates, service updates, system patches, security improvements and large IT projects. Day to day, you will coordinate multiple releases simultaneously, identify dependencies and risks, follow up on outstanding activities and constructively challenge where release readiness requirements have not been met.

The role calls for a thorough understanding of continual improvement and the software development lifecycle, together with strong planning and coordination skills, excellent interpersonal and communication skills, and a professional, adaptable approach.
Acting as the conduit between delivery and support teams, you will demonstrate credibility and knowledge of release and deployment practices. Confident stakeholder management is key, as the role involves working with a wide range of people across a wide range of roles and teams. A genuine willingness to learn is also important.

We are looking for someone with proven experience in release or change management within an IT Service Management function of a medium-to-large, multi-site professional services organisation, with a clear focus on customer service, security and compliance. Broad experience of legal industry applications would be an advantage.

A self-starter with excellent personal organisation and a 'can-do' attitude, you will meet tight deadlines, perform well under pressure, and contribute to a positive team environment, helping to champion quality, innovation, collaborative teamwork and service to the business.
Based in our London office, you will join the Global Systems team, which is responsible for supporting and maintaining the firm's technology across geographical regions. The team is split into six functional but collaborative groups – Infrastructure, Applications, Development, Solution Architecture, Testing, and Change and Release.

The priority for all IT activity is to maintain the highest levels of stability and reliability in the services delivered, and this role plays a key part in achieving that.

Areas of focus and responsibilities

Release planning and scheduling

• Coordinate the planning and delivery of technology releases across applications, infrastructure, devices and Microsoft 365 services, maintaining the release schedule, release pipeline report and IT communication schedule with the IT Change and Release Manager.
  Support the standardisation and management of evergreen technology releases, including regularly updated Microsoft and enterprise applications.
  Identify release dependencies, scheduling conflicts, risks and potential impacts, escalating significant concerns to the IT Change and Release Manager and relevant owners.

Release readiness

• Track release readiness evidence covering testing, known issues, dependencies, communications, support readiness, deployment responsibilities and rollback arrangements, proactively following up outstanding actions that could prevent or delay deployment.
• Coordinate release testing with technical teams, application owners and testing functions, ensuring testing status and outstanding issues are clearly understood ahead of deployment.
• Coordinate readiness assessments with technical and service owners, consolidate evidence and outstanding risks, and confirm that relevant approvals and security requirements are addressed in line with the Firm’s standards. Present recommendations to designated approvers and coordinate sign-off at release checkpoints.
• Coordinate deployment activities across technical teams, track implementation progress, and support post-release validation and early-life monitoring following significant deployments.

Pilots, communications and service transition

• Coordinate pilot and early-adopter programmes, including participant groups, deployment schedules, communications, feedback and outcomes.
• Coordinate clear, timely and user-friendly communications for pilots, application updates, upgrades and deployments.
• Support the transition of new or changed IT services into production by coordinating with delivery, project and support teams to confirm operational readiness, knowledge transfer and documentation handover.

Governance, reporting and continual improvement

• Work with the IT Change Analyst to confirm that releases requiring formal change approval have approved change records in place before deployment.
• Support the IT Change and Release Manager in developing, maintaining and improving release management processes, checklists, templates, readiness criteria and supporting documentation
• Work closely with IT and PMO teams to encourage adoption of the release management processes and to ensure compliance
• Maintain release reporting covering delivery against schedule, deployment outcomes, rollbacks, release-related incidents and outstanding readiness actions, highlighting trends and improvement opportunities.
• Capture release outcomes, issues, user feedback and lessons learned, and support reviews of unsuccessful, delayed or rolled-back releases to identify recurring issues and improvement actions.
• Assist the IT Change and Release Manager with regular audits of the release management process and recommend service improvements.
  Collaboration and operational support
• Maintain effective working relationships with colleagues across all offices to support a consistent approach to releases.
• Support the IT Change and Release Manager with release-related software asset management checks, confirming with relevant owners that licensing requirements are addressed.
• Maintain and expand working knowledge of current Firm-supported and future technologies to understand release impacts and communicate effectively with technical teams and non-technical stakeholders.

This list of duties and responsibilities is not exhaustive.  It is intended to describe the general content of, and requirements for the performance of this job, and as such, the role may also include the undertaking of additional tasks as required.

Experience required

• 2–4 years’ experience in IT release management, IT Service Management, project coordination or release/deployment roles 
• Relevant experience in IT release or change management, project coordination or IT service management within a medium to large organisation.
• Practical understanding of the release lifecycle: planning, testing, deployment and post-release review
• Understanding of release readiness, including testing, dependencies, operational readiness, communications and rollback
• Strong organisational skills to coordinate concurrent releases and stakeholders, manage competing priorities, and track deadlines, dependencies and actions.
• Experience working in a fast-paced environment with ability to adopt a flexible approach tailored to business needs, risk and impact
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills, including the confidence to facilitate meetings, challenge constructively and work with senior leaders, technical teams, business stakeholders and third parties.
• Strong interpersonal, written, verbal and presentation skills to engage technical and non-technical audiences at all levels.
• Working knowledge of Microsoft platforms like Windows and the Office Suite
• An understanding of legal and business application categories such as document management, practice management, CRM, document production and related integrated services is desirable.
• Experience supporting evergreen Microsoft 365, Office and Windows releases is advantageous.
• Familiarity with enterprise technologies and deployment platforms, such as Microsoft Intune and Azure Virtual Desktop, is beneficial.
• Strong organisation, attention to detail and judgement, with the ability to prioritise competing activity, meet deadlines and remain effective under pressure.
• An understanding of cybersecurity tools
• A recognised professional qualification or relevant degree is welcomed but is not essential where equivalent practical experience can be demonstrated.

The Essentials

• 9.30am to 5.30pm but flexibility is a must
• Hybrid working policy with a minimum of 2 days per week worked in the office
• 12 weeks' probation period
• 12 weeks’ notice period.
• Flexible benefit package including pension, private medical insurance, Denplan, season ticket loan, discounted gym memberships, lifestyle discount scheme, the ability to buy and sell holidays, flu jabs, doctors consultation service, cycle to work scheme, on-site café and more.

Information for Recruitment Agencies

Withers endeavours to recruit and fill vacancies directly. However, when we do need to engage with agencies, Withers operates a preferred supplier list and will not be accepting unsolicited applications from non-PSL agencies for this role.

Equal Opportunities Employment Statement 

It is the policy of Withers to provide equal opportunities for all employees in relation to recruitment, training and promotion.  Decisions in these areas will be made only by reference to the requirements of the job and shall not be influenced by any consideration of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy or maternity, race (including colour, nationality and ethnic and national origin), religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation.