Senior Release Manager

Senior Release Manager

Full Time Permanent Role

Greenogue 2 Office, D24

The Role

The Release Manager will collaborate with cross-functional teams including developers, testers, basis administrators, system environment owners and business stakeholders to minimise downtime and risks. You will oversee the end-to-end management of SAP software and integrated systems, ensuring seamless release cycles. The ideal candidate will have deep expertise in SAP ecosystem management, release processes, and environment provisioning, with a focus on maintaining high availability, compliance, and efficiency across all tiers (development, testing, preproduction, production).

Key Responsibilities

Release Management:  

• Plan, coordinate, and execute SAP centric software releases, including patches, upgrades, and custom developments, through structured pipelines from development to production. 
• Implement and optimize release strategies using tools like SAP Solution Manager (ChaRM), Transport Management System (TMS), or integrated CI/CD frameworks.  

Environment Management:

• Ensure that the boundary systems needed are connected or emulated, across the relevant systems, based on the needs of the release
• Conduct release planning meetings, manage change requests, and ensure adherence to release calendars and rollback procedures.  
• Monitor and mitigate risks during deployments, including impact assessments on surrounding systems (e.g., interfaces with ERP, CRM, BI tools).
• Ensure all SAP environments (dev, test, preprod, prod) are provisioned, configured, and ready for use, including hardware, software, and data refreshes.  
• Perform regular environment health checks, capacity planning, and synchronisation between tiers to maintain consistency and data integrity.  
• Manage landscape refreshes, system copies, and cloning processes using SAP tools like SWPM, HANA Studio, or third-party automation scripts.  
• Troubleshoot environment-related issues, with relevant teams, such as performance bottlenecks, connectivity problems, or configuration drifts, to support timely testing and go-lives.

Process Improvement and Compliance:  

• Develop and enforce best practices for change management, version control, and audit compliance (e.g., SOX, GDPR).  
• Collaborate with security teams to ensure environments meet access controls, encryption, and vulnerability standards.  
• Analyse post-release metrics to identify improvements in deployment speed, error rates, and overall system stability.  
• Mentor junior team members and ensure training on release and environment management tools and processes.

Stakeholder Collaboration:  

• Work closely with development, QA, operations, and business units to align release schedules with project timelines and business needs.  
• Provide clear release plan, status reports, dashboards, and recommendations to senior leadership on release progress and environment readiness.  
• Participate in incident management and root cause analysis for production issues related to releases or environments.

Required Qualifications and Experience

• 8+ years of experience in release management and environment provisioning within an environment of ERP, CRM and Integration platforms (ideally SAP).  
• Proven track record managing complex SAP landscapes and integrations with non-SAP systems.
• Hands-on experience with SAP tools such as Solution Manager, TMS, CTS+, and environment management utilities.  
• Familiarity with DevOps practices for SAP, ideally with Azure Dev Ops or SAP-focused CI/CD solutions.  
• Strong understanding of ITIL processes, particularly change, release, and configuration management.
• Experience working with senior stakeholders, working with cross-functional teams and building and maintaining relationships.

Desirable Skills and Technical Proficiency

• Knowledge of SAP Basis administration, ABAP/Java stacks, database management (e.g., HANA, Oracle, SQL Server), and cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, Azure for SAP).  
• Problem-Solving: Ability to diagnose and resolve complex issues in multi-tier environments under tight deadlines.  
• Communication: Excellent verbal and written skills for documenting processes, leading meetings, and presenting to non-technical stakeholders.  
• Project Management: Proficiency with tools like ADO or MS Project for tracking releases and tasks.  
• Analytical Thinking: Experience with monitoring tools (e.g., SAP Focused Run, Dynatrace) to assess environment performance and predict issues.

Uniphar Background

Uniphar Group is a rapidly expanding diversified healthcare services business with a global footprint and a proud heritage in Ireland.  Since Uniphar became a publicly listed company in 2019, the Group has grown organically and through a series of strategic acquisitions, which continue to strengthen Uniphar’s international reach. With a workforce of more than 3,000 spread across Ireland, United Kingdom, Mainland Europe, MENA and the USA, Uniphar is a trusted global partner to pharma and medtech manufacturers, working to improve patient access to medicines and treatments around the world.

Uniphar provides outsourced and specialised services to its clients, leveraging the strong relationships with 200+ of the world’s best known pharmaco-medical manufacturers across multiple geographies, enabled by our cutting-edge digital technology and our expert teams. Uniphar is organised into three key divisions: Uniphar Supply Chain & Retail, Uniphar Medtech and Uniphar Pharma

Please note that Uniphar is an equal-opportunity employer; we do not discriminate and welcome all responses. 

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