Position Summary
The Service Management Platform Technical Lead will lead the technical design, development, and delivery of enterprise service management solutions on ServiceNow. This role ensures implementations are scalable, secure, maintainable, and aligned to business outcomes. The Technical Lead partners closely with product owners, process owners, and cross-functional stakeholders to translate requirements into platform-native solutions, guide technical decisions, and mentor engineers to drive consistent, high-quality delivery.
This role is expected to be proactive and innovation-driven—continuously identifying opportunities to modernize workflows, reduce friction, improve data quality, and increase automation. A key focus is forward-thinking use of AI to make service management better—not only leveraging ServiceNow AI capabilities, but also applying AI/ML techniques and approved external AI services where appropriate.
While the role is currently focused on ServiceNow, the Technical Lead is expected to build capabilities that remain resilient and portable across service management platforms (e.g., Jira Service Management, Freshservice/Freshdesk, BMC Helix, Ivanti, Zendesk) as strategy evolves.
In-Office Requirements: 4 days per week in-office
Responsibilities
40% — Platform Leadership & Architecture
- Serve as technical authority for the service management platform; lead end-to-end solutioning and delivery (design → build → test → deploy).
- Produce and maintain architecture artifacts (target state designs, reference architectures, integration patterns, data/service models, governance guardrails).
- Lead technical intake: scope solutions, estimate level of effort, identify dependencies/risks, and shape technical roadmaps with stakeholders.
- Present technical options and tradeoffs to senior stakeholders; drive decisions and alignment.
25% — Delivery, Engineering Standards & Mentorship
- Provide hands-on development and technical oversight (Script Includes, Business Rules, Client Scripts, UI Policies, Flow Designer, catalog/workflow design).
- Establish and enforce engineering standards (coding conventions, reusable patterns, documentation, peer review, testing).
- Mentor and coach developers/admins; raise overall team capability through coaching and code reviews.
- Drive documentation quality (solution design, runbooks, knowledge enablement) to ensure maintainability and supportability.
15% — Governance, Reliability & Release Management
- Own platform governance: instance/environment strategy (dev/test/prod), scoped app standards, configuration controls, and release governance.
- Lead upgrade planning and readiness (impact analysis, regression approach, remediation planning) to ensure upgrade-safe solutions.
- Partner with operations/support teams to ensure platform reliability (performance, stability, monitoring/alerting patterns).
10% — Data, CMDB & Service Modeling
- Define and evolve core data standards (taxonomy, categories, catalog model, knowledge model, asset/CI/service model) for consistency and portability.
- Drive CMDB/service modeling direction (CSDM-aligned where applicable) and establish data quality controls and sustainment practices.
10% — AI, Innovation & Future-Proofing
- Drive an innovation pipeline: identify opportunities, validate with stakeholders, prototype quickly, and scale successful solutions.
- Identify and deliver high-value AI use cases (e.g., triage/routing, summarization, agent assist, knowledge improvement, CI/ticket enrichment) with safe human-in-the-loop patterns and governance.
- Maintain migration readiness artifacts (customization footprint, integration map, critical data flows, capability inventory) and evaluate alternative platforms as needed.
Qualifications
Education & Certificates
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent practical experience).
- ServiceNow CSA strongly preferred.
- Additional certifications (CAD, CIS ITSM/ITOM/CSM/HRSD) are a plus.
Professional Experience
- 6-10+ years in IT/software delivery with 4+ years of deep ServiceNow platform experience, including leading technical delivery for complex implementations.
- Hands-on experience designing and implementing enterprise workflows, integrations, and data models.
- Experience driving platform governance (release management, upgrade readiness, standards) and influencing senior stakeholders.
- Experience applying AI/automation to enterprise workflows (ServiceNow AI and/or external AI services) with appropriate controls
Competencies & Attributes
- Deep knowledge of ServiceNow architecture and development patterns; upgrade-safe design.
- Strong scripting and debugging skills; performance-aware development.
- Strong understanding of ServiceNow security model (ACLs, roles, scoped apps, data governance).
- Strong knowledge of ITSM/ESM processes (Incident, Request, Problem, Change, Knowledge, Asset/CMDB) and how to operationalize across platforms.
- Proven integration expertise (REST/webhooks, IntegrationHub, MID Server, auth/certificates, error handling, observability).
- CMDB/service modeling fluency; ability to drive data quality and sustainment practices.
- Executive-ready communication: can explain tradeoffs, drive decisions, and align stakeholders.
- Proactive, innovative mindset with a bias to action; builds reusable accelerators and guardrails.
- AI fluency for enterprise workflows (privacy, risk, evaluation, and operational controls).
- Designs for long-term resilience: avoids unnecessary lock-in and builds for reuse and portability.
Benefits/Compensation
The compensation range for this role is specific to Washington, DC and takes into account a wide range of factors including but not limited to the skill sets required/preferred; prior experience and training; licenses and/or certifications.
The anticipated base salary range for this role is $170,000 to $190,000
In addition to the base salary, the hired professional will enjoy a comprehensive benefits package spanning retirement benefits, health insurance, life insurance and disability, paid time off, paid holidays, family planning benefits and various wellness programs. Additionally, the hired professional may also be eligible to participate in an annual discretionary incentive program, the award of which will be dependent on various factors, including, without limitation, individual and organizational performance.
Due to the high volume of candidates, please be advised that only candidates selected to interview will be contacted by Carlyle.
About Us:
The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG) is a global investment firm with $475 billion of assets under management, across 678 investment vehicles as of March 31, 2026. Founded in 1987 in Washington, DC, Carlyle has grown into one of the world's largest and most successful investment firms, with more than 2,500 professionals operating in 28 offices in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia.
Carlyle’s purpose is to connect people, ideas, and capital to fuel growth for companies and performance for investors, which range from public and private pension funds to wealthy individuals and families to sovereign wealth funds, unions and corporations. Carlyle invests across three segments – Global Private Equity, Global Credit and Carlyle AlpInvest – and has deep expertise across industries, markets, and geographies.
At Carlyle, we believe that a wide spectrum of experiences and viewpoints drives performance and success. Our CEO, Harvey Schwartz, has stated that, "To build better businesses and create value for all of our stakeholders, we are focused on assembling leadership teams with the strongest insights from a range of perspectives." Reflecting this view, emphasis is placed on development, retention and inclusion through our internal processes and seven Employee Resource Groups (ERGs). We cultivate a culture where ideas are openly shared and challenged, connecting diverse expertise and perspectives to drive enduring value.