Network Operations Manager

Purpose of the Job:

Join Shoprite Group as a Network Operations Manager based in Brackenfell, Cape Town, Western Cape, leading end-to-end network service delivery across retail operations. The Network Operations Manager is accountable for end-to-end network service delivery, including people, process, performance, and vendor management, to ensure a stable, scalable, and resilient connectivity environment. The role leads the delivery of high-availability network services across retail operations, ensuring that stores remain fully operational and customer transactions are uninterrupted. Operating as the bridge between technical infrastructure and business operations, the role translates complex network challenges into clear business outcomes, driving operational resilience, proactive optimisation, and continuous service improvement. This role offers the opportunity to shape network strategy, enhance service delivery, and impact business continuity within South Africa's leading retailer.

Job Objectives:

Network Operations & Service Delivery

• Lead the day-to‑day network operations environment, ensuring high availability across platforms.
• Ensure continuous uptime and performance of store and enterprise connectivity services.
• Oversee service request management, monitoring, and performance tracking against defined SLAs.
• Ensure all network environments support uninterrupted retail trading and operations.

Incident Management & Operational Resilience

• Drive the incident and problem management function, ensuring rapid response to critical outages.
• Reduce Mean Time to Repair through structured escalation, root cause analysis, and corrective actions.
• Establish proactive monitoring, predictive analytics, and alerting capabilities to prevent incidents.
• Implement resilience measures including failover, redundancy, and continuity solutions.

Vendor, SLA & Contract Management

• Manage ISPs, OEMs, and service providers, ensuring delivery against contractual and SLA commitments.
• Conduct regular SLA reviews, vendor performance assessments, and governance forums.
• Enforce service credits, penalties, and performance improvements where required.
• Collaborate with vendors on solution design, optimisation, and network innovation initiatives.

Stakeholder Engagement & Business Alignment

• Act as the primary interface between technical teams and business stakeholders.
• Translate network performance into business impact.
• Provide clear communication on network health, risks, and improvement plans.
• Build strong relationships to enable aligned service delivery and decision‑making.

Project Delivery & Network Rollouts

• Lead and support network provisioning for new stores, closures, and upgrades.
• Participate in projects from concept through to implementation, ensuring delivery within timelines and risk constraints.
• Act as a single point of accountability for network deliverables within projects.
• Ensure smooth execution of change management and CAB processes.

Continuous Improvement & Innovation

• Analyse network trends, usage patterns, and incident data to identify optimisation opportunities.
• Drive automation, efficiency improvements, and proactive service enhancements.
• Evaluate and implement new technologies (e.g. SD‑WAN, improved Wi‑Fi, IoT readiness).
• Transition operations from reactive support to proactive network management.

Leadership & Team Management

• Lead and develop a team of network engineers and specialists, driving performance and accountability.
• Improve team productivity through clear processes, tooling, and performance metrics.
• Foster a culture of operational excellence, responsiveness, and innovation.
• Align internal teams and external partners to achieve service delivery objectives.

Governance, Financial & Risk Management

• Manage network budgets, forecasting, and cost optimisation initiatives.
• Ensure adherence to IT governance, CAB processes, and compliance standards.
• Collaborate with Security and Continuity teams to mitigate risks and vulnerabilities.
• Ensure governance frameworks support efficient and responsive service delivery.

Qualifications:

• IT related field Qualification (essential)
• ITIL or equivalent certification (preferred)

Experience:

• +6 years’ experience in IT Service Management within a retail stores or multi‑site branch environment, supporting store operations systems, connectivity, and in‑store technology. (essential)
• Of which 2 years experience in people management (essential)
• Experience in managing suppliers, contracts and service levels (essential)
• Strong technical expertise in VeloCloud, WAN, LAN, Wi‑Fi, and telephony environments (essential)

Knowledge and Skills:

• Experience in managing suppliers, contracts and service levels (essential)