Service Manager - SAP Release Management

Let's introduce ourselves

At Volvo Cars, we are making bold digital visions come true. We aim to be the leader in the automotive world by creating a digital ecosystem built around making our customers' lives less complicated. What we all have in common at Volvo Cars is our passion for protecting lives, our endless curiosity and our dedication to create a new future for the automotive industry. Our human centric focus is what separates us from all other car companies.

What you'll do

Volvo Cars has established the SAP CoE where it acts as the strategic and governance layer for SAP landscape. SAP CoE owns Volvo Cars SAP roadmap, process standards, and overall architecture to ensure fit-to-standard adoption and value realization from SAP investments. SAP CoE governs release and change-management policies, cybersecurity and compliance controls, and acts as the design authority for global templates.

We are seeking a highly experienced and proactive SAP Release Manager to lead, govern, and execute end-to-end release processes across our SAP landscape. This is a strategic role responsible for ensuring high-quality, stable, and timely releases while strictly adhering to SAP CoE governance, architecture principles, and security standards. The role demands a balance of technical depth, governance leadership, and operational excellence.

We are looking for candidate who is detail-oriented, structured, and influential with a strong background in SAP landscapes, change management, release planning, and quality assurance. As a SAP Release Manager you will play a critical role in strengthening our SAP CoE strategy, driving fit-to-standard adoption, and ensuring only architect-approved solutions enter production.

Main responsibilities

In this role, you will oversee SAP releases across our SAP landscape, leveraging SAP Solution Manager and Cloud ALM to establish a robust and structured release management framework.

Your primary focus will be on strengthening quality processes and ensuring compliance with best practices in SAP change and release management.

Below are few but not limited to, high level task overview to give you an understanding.

• SAP Release Strategy & Governance: You will be responsible for defining and implementing the best practices for SAP release management, ensuring alignment with business objectives.
• Release Calendar: You will be responsible for planning and maintaining the yearly release calendar in line with other SAP maintenance activities e.g. upgrade & refresh of non-prod systems.
• Quality Process Reinforcement: Strengthen the SAP release quality process by introducing structured testing, risk assessments, and validation frameworks.
• Change & Transport Management: Oversee the movement of SAP changes across development, test, and production environments using SAP Solution Manager and Cloud ALM.
• Stakeholder Collaboration: Work closely with SAP functional and technical teams, business users, and external vendors to coordinate releases efficiently.
• Risk Mitigation & Compliance: Ensure releases meet security, compliance, and audit requirements while minimizing disruptions.
• Automation & Continuous Improvement: Identify opportunities to automate release processes, enhance efficiency, and reduce manual interventions.
• Incident & Problem Resolution: Monitor release issues, troubleshoot problems, and drive continuous improvements in the release cycle.

What you'll bring

A minimum of 10 years of hands-on experience in SAP Release Management or a similar role.

You should have a strong expertise in SAP Solution Manager (configuring and maintaining ChaRM, Test Suite, Focused Build, and mandatory Solution Manager configurations) and SAP Cloud ALM.

• Deep understanding of SAP transport management, deployment strategies, and testing methodologies.
• Experience with DevOps and Agile methodology in SAP environments.
• Knowledge of SAP S/4HANA, ECC, and cloud-based SAP solutions.
• Experience in implementing or improving quality assurance and risk management within SAP releases.
• Knowledge of SAP Focused Build for enhanced release management.
• You should have reporting and presentation skills.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science or equivalent
• SAP certifications (e.g., SAP Solution Manager, Cloud ALM, SAP S/4HANA) is a strong plus.