About Northern Trust:
Northern Trust, a Fortune 500 company, is a globally recognized, award-winning financial institution that has been in continuous operation since 1889.
Northern Trust is proud to provide innovative financial services and guidance to the world’s most successful individuals, families, and institutions by remaining true to our enduring principles of service, expertise, and integrity. With more than 130 years of financial experience and over 22,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.
Job Title Major Incident Commander (Production Assurance Operations)
Role Summary
The Major Incident Commander (MIC) is an
Accountable leader
who is responsible for directing the end‑to‑end response to
high‑severity, business‑impacting technology incidents
. The role owns command, coordination, driving decision‑making, and executive communication during major incidents, ensuring
rapid service restoration, minimal business impact, and disciplined post‑incident learning
.
The MIC does
not fix systems directly
. Instead, they
lead through influence
, orchestrating cross‑functional technical teams (SRE, Infrastructure, Application, Network, Cloud, Security, Vendors) under intense time pressure while maintaining clear situational awareness and communication.
Key Responsibilities
1. Incident Command & Leadership
Act as the
designated Incident Commander
for all declared Major / Severity‑1 / Priority‑1 incidents.
Rapidly assess impact, scope, and severity; formally declare major incidents and activate response protocols.
Establish and maintain
clear command structure
, roles, and accountability throughout the incident lifecycle.
Drive incident progression from detection through mitigation, restoration, and closure.
2. Coordination & Execution
Lead and control incident bridges / war rooms, ensuring focus, discipline, and forward momentum.
Mobilize the
right technical resources
across infrastructure, applications, cloud, network, security, and third‑party vendors.
Prevent duplicated effort, conflicting actions, and unmanaged escalations.
Make time‑critical decisions (rollback, failover, isolation, degradation) based on technical input and business risk.
Drive Incident Managers and Incident analysts for fire calling, stakeholder management, bridge and communication management
3. Stakeholder & Executive Communication
Own
all major incident communications
end‑to‑end
Translate complex technical situations into
clear business impact statements
for senior leadership.
Have straight line communication with the CXO group on the impact, progress and status
Provide structured, time‑bound updates to executives, service owners, and business stakeholders.
Ensure consistency across incident bridges, leadership updates, and customer‑facing communications where applicable.
4. Governance, Process & Control
Ensure incidents are managed in line with
ITIL / SRE / internal Major Incident Management frameworks
.
Enforce escalation paths, decision rights, and incident classification standards.
Coordinate emergency changes and risk acceptance where required during live incidents.
Maintain accurate incident timelines, actions, and decisions for audit and review.
5. Post‑Incident Review & Continuous Improvement
Integrate with
post‑incident reviews (RCAs)
for all major incidents.
Contribute to high‑quality root cause analysis using structured methods (5 Whys, Fishbone, KT, FMEA).
Flash system weaknesses, recurring patterns, and resilience gaps.
Operating Model
Part of a
Production Assurance/ Incident Management Operations
function.
Participation in
on‑call or major incident rotation
, including off‑hours and weekends.
Works closely with Service Owners, Engineering, Architecture, Security, and Vendor Management teams
Required Experience & Skills
Core Experience
Overall 18+ years of IT-BFSI Delivery
Proven experience acting as
Incident Commander or Major Incident Lead
in complex, 24×7 enterprise environments.
10+ years in
IT Operations, SRE, Incident Management, or Production Support
roles.
Hands‑on exposure to
mission‑critical systems
(cloud, infrastructure, applications, networks, identity, databases).
Technical & Operational Knowledge
Strong understanding of
modern distributed systems
and failure modes.
Familiarity with
cloud platforms (AWS / Azure / GCP)
and cloud‑native architectures.
Working knowledge of monitoring, alerting, and observability tools (e.g., Dynatrace, Splunk, Prometheus, Grafana).
Experience with ITSM tools (ServiceNow, Remedy, Jira Service Management, or equivalent).
Strong understanding of Custody, Trade and Payments Operations will be an added advantage
Leadership & Behavioral Competencies
Demonstrates strong situational control and composure during high-pressure, high-demand incidents.
Leads decisively through effective delegation of authority and accountability.
Exhibits assertive leadership by rapidly taking ownership and directing incident response actions.
Drives war room operations with clear command, structured governance, and disciplined execution.
Communicates clear, concise, and outcome-focused deliverables with confidence to senior executives, technical teams, and business service delivery leaders.
Certifications (Preferred, Not Mandatory)
ITIL v4
SRE or Cloud certifications
Incident Command / Crisis Management training
Working with Us:
As a Northern Trust partner, greater achievements await. You will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture in an organization where financial strength and stability is an asset that emboldens us to explore new ideas.
Movement within the organization is encouraged, senior leaders are accessible, and you can take pride in working for a company committed to assisting the communities we serve! Join a workplace with a greater purpose.
We’d love to learn more about how your interests and experience could be a fit with one of the world’s most admired and sustainable companies! Build your career with us and apply today. #MadeForGreater
Reasonable accommodation
Northern Trust is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please email our HR Service Center at
MyHRHelp@ntrs.com
.
We hope you’re excited about the role and the opportunity to work with us. We value an inclusive workplace and understand flexibility means different things to different people.
Apply today and talk to us about your flexible working requirements and together we can achieve greater.
About Our Bangalore Office
The Northern Trust Bangalore office, established in 2005, is home to over 5,600 employees. In this stunning office, space, we offer fantastic amenities which include our Arrival Hub – Jungle, the GameZone, and the Employee Experience Zone that appeal to both clients and employees.
Learn more.
