Balaji's CV
Balaji Rathnaiah
Consulting Manager | Platform Architecture
Profile summary
Strategic Consulting Manager and Platform Architect with 16 years shaping enterprise ServiceNow and ITIL outcomes. Known for platform governance, practice leadership, and cross-cultural team management across GCC and international markets. Committed to delivering scalable platform architecture, OOTB best practices, and alignment with business strategy.
Career highlights
Platform Architecture And Governance: Chaired governance meetings and enforced platform standards and architecture principles, partnering with account executives and support channels to maintain compliance across a GCC client portfolio.
Managed Services And Practice Growth: Co-led a managed services engagement with a ServiceNow Elite partner for a Fortune 500 client, overseeing delivery quality across hybrid teams spanning India and the USA.
Platform Standardization And Delivery: Decommissioned a legacy system and legacy discovery tooling, deploying ITIL best practices for a global bank to standardize operations across an 11-country footprint.
Compliance And Risk Management: Delivered a GRC and IRM implementation that improved policy and compliance visibility by 50% and reduced risk exposure by 25% for a shipping-sector client.
Key skills
Professional experience
Reporting to the practice head, directed cross-functional enterprise programs and architecture governance across the GCC region, managing complex client portfolios encompassing major financial institutions and government entities.
- Steered digital transformation programs across IT, Finance, HR, Procurement, Facilities, and Field Services for enterprise clients.
- Architected end-to-end ServiceNow transformations spanning ITSM, ITOM, CSM, FSM, Custom Apps, LCNC, and Employee Service Center.
- Decommissioned a legacy system and discovery tooling while deploying ITIL best practices for a global bank across an 11-country footprint.
- Authored roughly 80 BRDs across a diverse enterprise client portfolio following discovery and design workshops with stakeholders.
- Maintained a 5/5 CSAT rating with zero client escalations through trusted advisory on platform design and delivery decisions.
Steered platform standardization and technical debt reduction initiatives within a delivery organization. Directed critical system integrations and managed services engagements across hybrid teams. Defined platform governance frameworks and architectural standards for enterprise clients.
- Hosted weekly and monthly governance forums, enforcing ServiceNow platform standards and an out-of-the-box-first policy across a 60-person delivery organization.
- Directed critical integrations via Integration Hub and custom APIs connecting the platform to SAP, core banking, and retail banking systems, maintaining architectural consistency.
- Delivered a GRC/IRM implementation that improved policy and compliance visibility by 50% and reduced risk exposure by 25% for a shipping-sector client.
Reported to practice leadership while overseeing enterprise ServiceNow ITSM and CSM delivery engagements. Directed agile teams across project managers, architects, and developers to move requirements through planning, development, testing, and closure.
- Facilitated stakeholder workshops to establish current state understanding and target state direction for ServiceNow Agent Workspace, portals, and communities.
- Translated customer pain points and business requirements into actionable user stories and technical specifications.
- Supported business development through ServiceNow demonstrations and proof of concept engagements to position platform capabilities.
Partnered with enterprise customers, project managers, and architects to translate business requirements into implementation-ready ServiceNow user stories. Defined and supported ITSM processes within the Microsoft Cloud practice and cross-functional delivery environment.
- Configured ServiceNow platform components including users, groups, roles, forms, layouts, business rules, UI actions, SLAs, and templates.
- Facilitated ITIL and ITSM process onboarding and supported adoption activities in partnership with process owners and training teams.
- Developed user acceptance testing strategies and test cases covering Incident, Problem, and Change Management modules alongside Remedy-to-ServiceNow integration scenarios.
- Coordinated defect resolution efforts between developers and project managers while supporting stakeholder readiness through training and process enablement.
- Decommissioned a 10-year legacy system and legacy discovery tooling, replacing both with ServiceNow ITOM Discovery and standardized ITIL practices.
- Executed a GRC implementation that improved compliance visibility by 50 percent and reduced risk exposure by 25 percent for a shipping-sector client.
- Facilitated stakeholder workshops to establish current state understanding and target state direction for ServiceNow implementations.
- Directed agile delivery from planning and development through testing and closure of user stories.
- Configured ServiceNow platform components including users, groups, roles, forms, layouts, business rules, UI actions, SLAs, and templates.
- Facilitated ITIL and ITSM process onboarding and supported adoption activities in partnership with process owners and training teams.
- Directed defect resolution workflows across developers and project managers.
- Executed stakeholder readiness activities through formal training and process enablement.
Education
Grade A
Certifications
Languages
English
Telugu
Kannada
Hindi