NOC Shift Team Leader

Job Objective:

 To lead and coordinate the NOC shift team in delivering 24/7 operational support across network services, ensuring effective incident management, service restoration and proactive monitoring. The role is accountable for maintaining service availability, driving operational discipline and enhancing the customer experience, while ensuring compliance with internal processes, SOPs and SLA commitments.

The Shift Team Leader acts as the 'primary operational authority during the shift', ensuring timely decision-making, effective cross-functional coordination (NMC, TAC, Engineering and Service Management) and the consistent execution of standard operating procedures.

Reporting Line: NOC Manager

Key Duties and Responsibilities

• Lead, supervise and coordinate the NOC shift team to ensure efficient operations, adherence to SOPs, and achievement of SLAs and KPIs
• Act as the operational lead and incident commander during the shift, ensuring a structured response, sound decision-making and effective coordination during major incidents
• Deputise for the NOC Manager when required, providing leadership oversight and operational decision-making
• Manage workload distribution, prioritisation and the real-time execution of shift activities in a fast-paced operational environment
• Lead end-to-end incident management, including detection, escalation, troubleshooting and resolution, within agreed timelines
• Serve as the primary escalation point for high-priority and major incidents, ensuring timely restoration and minimal service impact
• Ensure accurate logging, timely updates and proper closure of all incidents and service requests in NetSuite, maintaining high standards of data integrity
• Oversee proactive network monitoring and ensure timely responses to alarms, events and performance degradation
• Manage supplier and vendor escalations to support effective incident resolution and service restoration
• Drive root cause identification and support the preparation and validation of Reason for Outage (RFO) reports and service improvement actions
• Act as the client-facing escalation point, ensuring clear, timely and professional communication during incidents
• Collaborate with Service Managers and internal stakeholders to maintain high levels of customer satisfaction and service delivery
• Lead shift handovers and validate daily, weekly, monthly and ad hoc operational reporting.
• Identify operational gaps, risks and inefficiencies, and drive or escalate corrective actions as appropriate
• Contribute to continuous improvement through SOP enhancement, participation in RCAs and the application of operational best practice
• Coordinate with TAC, NMC, Engineering and Field teams to resolve complex issues and support planned maintenance activities
• Support field operations where required, including troubleshooting, testing and service validation

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering, IT or a related field
• Professional certifications such as CCNA, JNCIA/JNCIS, ITIL or MEF are preferred
• Willingness to work on a 24/7 shift rotation, including nights, weekends and public holidays

Experience and Skills

• 5+ years’ relevant experience in a telecommunications or NOC environment
• Proven experience of team leadership within a 24/7 operations environment
• Strong knowledge of technology platforms across transport networks (SDH, DWDM and OTN) and data/IP networks (BGP, Ethernet and IP/MPLS)
• Hands-on experience with:
  • Ticketing tools, such as NetSuite or equivalent platforms
  • Monitoring systems, such as PRTG, NMS, Cacti and SolarWinds
• Strong incident management and troubleshooting skills
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills
• Ability to work under pressure and make sound decisions during critical incidents
• Strong analytical and reporting skills
• Ability to operate effectively in a high-pressure, real-time operations environment
• Strong leadership presence and sound decision-making capability
• Customer-focused, with excellent relationship management skills
• Detail-oriented, with a strong focus on operational excellence

Attributes

• Client-focused, relationship builder
• Integrity, honesty with high ethical standards
• Boundless, passionate and flexible
• Personal excellence, accuracy and attention to detail
• Collaborative, achieve results through teamwork and partnerships