Change Release Manager

Change & Release Manager (Outside IR35) Location: Manchester, UK (Hybrid Working) Role Overview We are seeking an experienced Release Manager to lead and govern the end-to-end release management process across a complex enterprise technology landscape. This role is critical in ensuring that software, configuration, and platform changes are planned, coordinated, tested, approved, and deployed in a controlled and efficient manner. The successful candidate will bring strong release governance, process discipline, and stakeholder management experience within large enterprise organisations, alongside practical domain knowledge of Salesforce and ideally Microsoft Dynamics environments. While platform experience is valuable, the key priority is someone who understands how to run robust, scalable release processes across multiple teams, suppliers, and business functions.

Key Responsibilities Release Management & Governance Own and continuously improve the enterprise release management framework, standards, controls, and governance processes. Manage the end-to-end lifecycle of releases across multiple applications, platforms, and business units. Build and maintain release calendars, deployment schedules, and integrated change plans. Chair release readiness meetings, CAB inputs, go/no-go decisions, and post-release reviews. Ensure releases meet agreed quality gates, documentation standards, approvals, and compliance requirements. Coordinate dependencies across technology teams, third parties, infrastructure, security, testing, and business stakeholders. Drive consistency, repeatability, and continuous improvement in release execution. Delivery & Operational Excellence Minimise release risk, service disruption, and business impact through strong planning and controls. Oversee environment readiness, deployment sequencing, rollback planning, and contingency management. Track release KPIs such as success rates, incidents, lead times, failed changes, and deployment performance. Support transition from project delivery into BAU operations. Manage major / high-profile releases involving multiple concurrent workstreams. Stakeholder Management Engage senior business and technology stakeholders across programmes and operational teams. Communicate release scope, risks, milestones, decisions, and readiness status clearly. Build effective working relationships across internal teams, vendors, and system integrators. Platform / Domain Focus Support releases involving Salesforce platforms (Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Experience Cloud or related ecosystem). Understand platform-specific release considerations such as metadata deployments, sandboxes, regression testing, integration dependencies, and governance. Ideally bring exposure to Microsoft Dynamics 365 release processes and environments. Coordinate enterprise releases where CRM platforms interact with broader architecture and business systems.

Required Experience Proven experience as a Release Manager within a large, complex enterprise environment, particularly with Salesforce Strong knowledge of release management best practice, governance, controls, and operating models. Experience managing releases across multiple teams, applications, suppliers, and business stakeholders. Demonstrable success delivering structured release processes in regulated or highly governed environments. Strong understanding of change management and IT service management principles. Hands-on experience supporting Salesforce releases in enterprise settings. Excellent planning, risk management, and stakeholder communication skills. Comfortable operating at both strategic governance level and practical delivery level. Desirable Experience Experience with Microsoft Dynamics 365. ITIL certification or equivalent service management background. Experience with DevOps / CI-CD tooling and modern deployment practices. Knowledge of Agile, Scrum, and hybrid delivery methodologies. Experience with enterprise tooling such as Jira, Azure DevOps, ServiceNow, Copado, Gearset, or similar. Experience in transformation programmes, M&A integration, or multi-vendor landscapes. Key Competencies Process-driven with strong attention to control and detail. Calm and decisive under pressure. Strong leadership and facilitation skills. Excellent communicator with executive presence. Highly organised with the ability to manage competing priorities. Pragmatic, collaborative, and delivery-focused. Continuous improvement mindset.