Service Desk Manager - Secret Clearance

The Service Desk Manager oversees daily operations of the external-facing service desk, supporting customers/clients with product, technical, or account issues. This role combines hands-on customer support with team leadership - supervising analysts, managing ticket/call queues, and ensuring service levels and customer satisfaction targets are met., * Supervise, schedule, and mentor Service Desk Analysts/Agents handling customer calls, chats, and tickets.

• Serve as the escalation point for complex, sensitive, or dissatisfied-customer issues.
• Monitor queues (calls, chat, tickets) in real time to ensure SLAs and response-time targets are met.
• Track and report on key metrics: CSAT/NPS, average handle time, first-contact resolution, SLA compliance, ticket backlog.
• Monitor and support Tier 0 (self-service/chatbot) deflection effectiveness for external users.
• Develop and maintain customer-facing support procedures, macros/canned responses, and knowledge base articles.
• Handle escalated customer complaints professionally, aiming for first-contact resolution and retention.
• Coach agents on product knowledge, communication skills, and de-escalation techniques.
• Coordinate with Product, Engineering, and Account Management teams on recurring or high-impact customer issues.
• Identify trends in customer inquiries and recommend process, product, or documentation improvements.
• Administer the ticketing/CRM system (e.g., Zendesk, Salesforce Service Cloud, Freshdesk) - queue setup, routing rules, tagging.
• Ensure compliance with SLAs defined in customer contracts and service agreements.
• Support onboarding and training of new customer support agents.
• Assist in after-hours/weekend coverage planning as needed for customer-facing support.
• Work hours are either 6A-2P or 12P-8P ET

• Associate’s or Bachelor’s degree, or Associate degree +2 years relevant experience, or 4 years relevant experience.
• Secret Clearance
• 3+ years of experience in customer-facing technical support or service desk role and 1+ years supervisory experience.
• Strong customer service and de-escalation skills; experience handling escalated/upset customers.
• Experience with CRM/ticketing platforms (Zendesk, Salesforce, Freshdesk, ServiceNow, etc.).
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Ability to multitask across channels (phone, email, chat) under time pressure.
• Demonstrated ability to coach and motivate a customer-facing team.

Preferred Qualifications

• Familiarity with SLA-driven, contractual support environments.
• ITIL Foundation or customer service certification (e.g., HDI) a plus.