Senior Manager, Change and Release Management Operations (ITSM)

About Northern Trust As a global leader in innovative wealth management, asset servicing, asset management and banking services, Northern Trust (Nasdaq: NTRS) is proud to guide the world’s most successful individuals, families, corporations and institutions. Since 1889, we have aligned our efforts with our three guiding Principles That Endure: Service, Expertise, and Integrity. Together, they reflect the three cornerstones of business conduct which we strive to instill in our employees, whom we call partners, and to provide to our clients and the communities we serve worldwide. With more than 135 years of financial experience and over 24,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service. We are seeking a Senior Change and Release Management leader to own and continue to evolve the Change and Release Management function , enabling safe, predictable, and efficient delivery of production changes across a complex, highly regulated technology environment.   This role is responsible for leading the day-to-day execution, governance, and continual improvement of ITSM Change and Release Management practices across a complex, regulated technology environment. The role ensures production changes and releases are delivered safely, predictably, and efficiently while balancing business agility, operational stability, risk management, and regulatory compliance. This role is accountable for ensuring that change governance enables business outcomes , balancing velocity, stability, risk, and regulatory expectations at enterprise scale. This leader will be accountable for operational governance, change risk oversight, release readiness, CAB leadership, stakeholder engagement, process optimization, and performance reporting based on the OKRs and KPIs. The role partners closely with Technology Infrastructure, Application Development, Information Security, Risk & Control, Audit, Service Management, and Business stakeholders to drive disciplined execution and continuous service improvement Key Responsibilities Change Governance, CAB & Risk Decisioning Lead the execution of end‑to‑end Change Management process, ensuring compliance with IT controls, regulatory standards, and enterprise risk frameworks Chair and actively participate in Change Advisory Board (CAB) forums, driving collaborative, well‑informed change decisions Partner closely with Business Units (BUs), Technology, and Operations leaders to ensure risk‑based, outcome‑focused decisioning on changes Promote and sustain a risk‑aware, decision‑driven change culture, with strong exception evaluation and mitigation strategies Partner with Risk & Control, Audit, and other Lines of Defense to evidence control monitoring and ongoing compliance Oversee internal and external change audits, ensuring timely execution, transparent issue management, and senior leadership visibility Monitor policy adherence and escalate non-compliance, control weaknesses, and operational risks Review high-risk, major, and emergency changes to ensure adequate planning, testing, fallback, and implementation readiness. Drive reduction in change-related incidents through robust governance and proactive risk identification. Release and Change Operational Excellence Design and operate lean, scalable, and resilient change and release processes suitable for high‑volume production environments Define, implement, and enforce SLAs across the full change lifecycle Produce executive‑ready month‑end change reporting, highlighting throughput, risk trends, systemic issues, and improvement opportunities Drive continuous improvement initiatives to improve production stability and operational maturity Own operational governance of enterprise release activities across application and infrastructure portfolios ensuring compliance with the controls Partner with Release Owners, Product Teams, and Technology Leaders to improve release predictability and