Job Description

Information Technology Services (ITS) at the University at Albany seeks applicants for the Director of Business Alignment. This position is responsible for ensuring ITS engagement and support are aligned to University priorities across teaching and learning, research, athletics, advancement, communications and marketing, and administrative functions.

The Director leads the Business Alignment unit in developing and maintaining strong relationships and strategic partnerships with University divisions, schools, and colleges to understand business objectives, define shared visions, and shape technology needs and opportunities that articulate business value and align with strategic goals.

The Director relies on managers within the unit to maintain day-to-day awareness of the demand and project pipeline, from needs and opportunities under review through authorized projects in progress, to support shared expectations with executive leaders and inform ongoing prioritization decisions. The Director is committed to the efficient capture of business technology needs in a high-volume environment and to accurate, timely reporting of status and progress on ITS work.

The Director collaborates closely with other ITS units that comprise the service and project delivery teams in a matrixed IT organization to ensure coordinated planning, prioritization, and delivery.

The Business Alignment unit's primary areas of responsibility include business relationship management (continuous engagement and portfolio review with executive leaders); demand management (efficient capture and assessment of project requests); project and project portfolio management (project selection, portfolio optimization, resource allocation, and project management); and business analysis (discovery, requirements definition, and translation of business needs into clear, actionable work for ITS delivery teams).

Primary Responsibilities

• Business Relationship Management
  • Responsible for shaping, supporting, and enforcing IT policy for the university.
  • Responsible for formulating and influencing strategic direction in alignment with university-wide priorities.
  • Work to ensure ITS involvement and leadership in all stages of planning and implementation of technology at the university.
  • Build and enhance ITS' strategic partnership with business areas by leading collaborative efforts to develop and maintain a shared vision and roadmap for ITS involvement and support.
  • Lead and coordinate ITS' readiness, preparatory activities, and execution of business relationship meetings with various levels of university leadership.
  • Develop managers to be effective business partners that capture, shape, and guide all campus IT needs through ITS work-management processes for efficient intake, enterprise architecture assessment, approval, prioritization, scheduling, resourcing, and delivery coordination.
  • Build and maintain high-level familiarity with the strategic and functional objectives of each University division, and the role of technology in enabling and supporting each.
  • Ensure the Business Alignment unit takes a lead role in messaging the University's IT governance, guiding principles, policies, and procedures.
  • Maintain a continual state of readiness for reporting/show-back to executive leaders.
• Demand Management
  • Ensure that business needs and opportunities are recognized and recorded in a timely fashion.
  • Ensure that ITS engages efficiently with customers to capture and shape fully formed requests that articulate value and are ready for review and assessment.
  • Confirm executive sponsorship for requests in advance of decision to initiate projects.
  • Oversee process development and improvement for demand management
  • Update portfolio prioritizations with executive sponsors prior to advancing new projects to the initiation phase.
• Project and Project Portfolio Management
  • Establish and maintain overall accountability for ITS project delivery and portfolio outcomes.
  • Provide strategic leadership for the university's IT project portfolio by setting portfolio governance expectations, decision criteria, and performance measures aligned to University and ITS priorities.
  • Lead, through the Project Portfolio Manager, the end-to-end portfolio lifecycle (intake through closure), ensuring consistent business cases, scoping, prioritization recommendations, and transparent decision documentation.
  • Oversee portfolio resource allocation and capacity planning in partnership with ITS delivery leaders; escalate and resolve prioritization and resourcing conflicts to protect critical-path commitments.
  • Ensure timely, accurate portfolio reporting (status, schedule, budget, benefits, risks, dependencies) and deliver executive-level communications that enable informed decisions and maintain shared expectations.
  • Direct portfolio-level risk, issue, and dependency management, ensuring appropriate escalation paths, mitigation planning, and governance cadence for high-impact initiatives.
  • Sponsor continuous improvement of project and portfolio management practices, standards, and tools (e.g., stage gates, dashboards, templates), ensuring adoption across ITS delivery teams through training, coaching, and accountability.
• Business Analysis
  • Establish and maintain overall accountability for business analysis capabilities and outcomes.
  • Provide strategic leadership for business analysis as a discipline by defining expectations and standards for requirements gathering, customer experience, and value realization.
  • Drive high-quality deliverables, including discovery and facilitation, current-state and future-state process mapping, and documentation of functional and non-functional requirements.
  • Ensure business analysis activities are integrated into demand management and project initiation, so requests are sufficiently defined, prioritized, and ready for enterprise architecture assessment, estimating, and delivery planning.
  • Champion continuous improvement of business analysis practices, templates, and tools, and develop staff capabilities through coaching, training, and a community of practice.
• Staff Supervision
  • Lead and manage direct reports by providing guidance, support, and performance feedback to ensure goals, programs, activities, and personnel practices are consistent with and contribute to the University's mission.
  • Lead employees for maximum performance and dedication, fostering a positive and productive work environment.
  • Complete performance management feedback and goals timely and per requirements, offering constructive feedback and developing improvement plans.
• Other reasonable duties as assigned.