Technical Manager - Zendesk ( 6 months contractual role)

Role Summary
We are seeking a high-impact Technical Program Manager (TPM) to lead the strategy, evolution, and technical stability of our Customer Experience (CX) ecosystem. Having completed a migration from Salesforce to Zendesk Enterprise, we are now building a proactive, automated, high-efficiency CRM.
In this role, you will serve as the "Enterprise Systems & AI Product Owner." You will lead a team of two Zendesk Specialists, collaborate directly with enterprise clients to scope API integrations, and drive cross-functional engineering projects. You will be responsible for turning Zendesk into an AI-enabled workspace—deploying Zendesk Copilot, AI Agents for deflection, Zendesk AutoQA, Zendesk WFM, Glean Enterprise Search, and Gemini LLM integrations.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic AI Ecosystem & Native Zendesk Optimization
Autonomous AI Deflection: Build, optimize, and oversee Zendesk AI Agents (Bots) to increase self-service resolution rates for Tier-1 inquiries.
Agent Copilot & Productivity: Architect and fine-tune Zendesk Copilot (Auto-Assist workflows, real-time ticket summarization, and suggested next actions) to reduce Average Handle Time (AHT) and cognitive load.
100% Automated Quality Governance: Established Zendesk AutoQA scorecards and automated grading logic to continuously evaluate 100% of human and bot interactions, using sentiment analysis to flag churn risks and coaching opportunities.
Workforce Management (WFM): Oversee Zendesk WFM (Tymeshift) configuration to transition from reactive staffing to data-driven, predictive capacity planning.
Platform Architecture & Tool Integrations (Glean / Gemini)
Enterprise AI & Search Readiness: Partner with engineering and data teams to connect enterprise search tools (Glean) directly into Zendesk so agents can search across Confluence, Drive, and internal tools from a single workspace.
Gemini LLM Workflows: Build data pipelines and API hooks to connect Gemini/LLMs for predictive retention modeling, automated drafts, and custom object field enrichment.
Internal Tool Middleware: Oversee integrations between Zendesk, internal ERPs, product databases, and middleware (e.g., Webhooks) to create a single 360-degree CRM workspace.
Customer API Discovery & Developer Experience
External Client Solutions: Interface directly with strategic business clients and account executives to gather technical requirements for direct API access, custom webhooks, and dedicated customer portal integrations.
Developer Experience: Partner with internal software engineers to maintain clean, secure, rate-managed, and well-documented Zendesk REST APIs for customer usage.
Governance, Stability & Knowledge Architecture
Environment Governance: Establish strict Sandbox-to-Production release pipelines, manage API rate limits, audit trigger loops, and ensure compliance (GDPR/Data Privacy).
Knowledge Architecture (KCS): Lead a Knowledge-Centered Service strategy to consolidate company-wide documentation into a structured source of truth indexed within Zendesk.
Team Leadership: Directly manage and mentor 2 Zendesk Specialists, managing sprint planning, task prioritization, and platform issue triage.
5+ years in Technical Program Management, Systems Engineering, or CX Platform Ownership.
Zendesk Enterprise Mastery: Demonstrated expertise in architecting complex Zendesk instances, including Sandbox environments, Custom Objects, Omnichannel Routing, Copilot, AI Agents (Bots), AutoQA, and WFM.
Integration & API Technical Depth: Proven experience with REST APIs, Webhooks, JSON, OAuth, Postman, and middleware integration tools (Workato, Zapier, n8n).
AI & Search Engines: Hands-on experience or technical project delivery involving Enterprise Search (e.g., Glean, Coveo) and LLMs (e.g., Google Gemini, OpenAI).
Client Engagement: Ability to run discovery meetings directly with tech teams to translate business needs into clear technical specifications.
Preferred Qualifications:
Zendesk Certified Systems Architect.
Demonstrated track record implementing Knowledge-Centered Service (KCS) principles across multi-department teams.

Employment type
Full-time

Work arrangement
Hybrid