Lead Business Applications Engineer (NY)

Position Title: Lead Business Applications Engineer (NY)

Entity: KBRA Holdings, LLC

Employment Type: Full-time

Location: New York, New York

Summary/Overview:

Kroll Bond Rating Agency, Inc. (KBRA) is seeking an experienced, hands-on Lead Business Applications Engineer to lead and evolve its global Business Applications function. This role will carry primary responsibility for managing the Business Applications Team (currently 2 engineers), overseeing KBRA’s SaaS application ecosystem, and driving the strategic development and evolution of the function.

This is a highly hands-on technical leadership role. The ideal candidate will not only lead initiatives and mentor engineers, but also actively participate in the day-to-day administration, support, integration, troubleshooting, and optimization of KBRA’s enterprise applications environment. This individual will be expected to bring forward-thinking leadership to modernize and scale the Business Applications practice while remaining deeply involved in operational execution and technical decision-making across the organization’s SaaS platforms and integrations.

The role is based in New York City and will require a minimum of three on-site days per week (Tuesday–Thursday), with flexibility on remaining days. You are expected to participate in a team on-call rotation as well. Occasional travel to other offices may be required based on operational and project needs.

About the Job:

You will build, maintain, support, and lead the management of KBRA’s SaaS environments and enterprise application ecosystem. This role requires a strong technical operator who is comfortable rolling up their sleeves and directly handling application administration, troubleshooting, integrations, upgrades, deployments, user support escalations, and platform optimization efforts.

You will be responsible for both strategic leadership and hands-on execution across KBRA’s business application platforms, driving operational excellence, lifecycle management, automation, governance, and continuous improvement initiatives.

This role will own the continued management and integration of SaaS applications across KBRA, including SSO, entitlements, identity management, security integrations, governance, and user access processes. You will work directly within these systems on a daily basis while partnering closely with Information Security, Infrastructure, Endpoint Engineering, Desktop Support, and Product teams to ensure SaaS platforms remain secure, stable, scalable, and aligned with business objectives.

You will also play a key leadership role in larger enterprise SaaS implementations and platform initiatives, including both strategic oversight and hands-on implementation support for systems such as CMS, DMS, Box, Zoom, Slack, Atlassian Suite, and other enterprise productivity and collaboration platforms. This role will work closely with business stakeholders and the Product organization around implementation of new features, enhancements, integrations, and adoption strategies.

In addition, you will establish stronger ownership and governance around application lifecycle management, including software version control, upgrade planning, application standardization, testing, and deployment coordination. While the Endpoint Engineering team will remain responsible for deployment mechanisms and tooling, this role will own application-level governance, including determining approved versions, rollout strategy, compatibility management, testing coordination, and user/application assignment standards.

The ideal candidate is someone who enjoys balancing leadership responsibilities with technical execution and is comfortable serving as both an escalation point and a primary contributor on critical initiatives. You will help shape the future direction of the Business Applications function by identifying opportunities for automation, process improvement, modernization, and better operational scalability.

This role requires a proactive, highly technical leader who can elevate the team, improve service delivery, and build a mature, forward-thinking enterprise applications practice while remaining actively engaged in the day-to-day engineering and operational work.

Additional responsibilities include:

• Managing and mentoring the Business Applications team
• Acting as a senior technical escalation point for Enterprise Applications support issues
• Performing hands-on administration and support across SaaS platforms and integrations
• Performing routine audits, upgrades, testing, and health checks across SaaS platforms
• Troubleshooting complex application, authentication, and integration issues
• Managing vendor relationships and SaaS renewals
• Driving platform reliability, uptime, security, and operational best practices
• Leading cross-functional collaboration for enterprise application initiatives
• Developing standards, documentation, operational procedures, and governance processes for application management
• Coordinating closely with Endpoint Engineering on application deployments, updates, and software lifecycle management
• Identifying opportunities for automation and operational efficiency improvements

About You:

You will be successful in this role if:

You can work in a fast-paced and dynamic environment with minimal supervision. You possess excellent interpersonal and communication skills, strong attention to detail, and proven leadership capabilities. You are highly analytical, solution-oriented, and capable of balancing strategic initiatives with deep hands-on technical responsibilities.

You are comfortable owning platforms end-to-end, troubleshooting complex issues, and directly contributing to engineering and operational work rather than functioning solely in a managerial capacity.

You should have working experience and familiarity with the following processes, technologies, and qualifications:

Required Qualifications:

• 4–5 years of experience working in IT business/enterprise applications in a corporate environment required
• Experience leading or mentoring technical teams
• Strong hands-on experience administering SaaS and enterprise application environments
• Computer Science degree/work experience or similar
• Microsoft Office 365/Azure SSO management experience
• Active Directory/Entra management experience
• Strong understanding of Group Policy
• Experience managing SaaS integrations, entitlements, identity governance, and access controls
• Strong understanding of application lifecycle management, software version governance, testing, and deployment coordination
• Strong understanding of basic networking/system troubleshooting
• Strong understanding and experience with ticketing systems/escalation protocols
• Vendor and project management experience
• Experience leading or supporting enterprise SaaS implementations
• Familiarity with security applications/processes
• Experience troubleshooting authentication, access, and SaaS integration issues in enterprise environments
• Familiarity with Generative AI tools such as ChatGPT for research, data insights, and general productivity is a plus.

Preferred:

• Experience collaborating with Product, Infrastructure, Endpoint Engineering, and InfoSec teams
• Experience with automation and scripting for SaaS/application administration
• Zoom, Slack, Atlassian Products, Box, CMS, and DMS platform experience

Salary Range:

The anticipated annual base salary range for this full-time position is $100,000 to $130,000. Offer amounts are determined by factors such as experience, skills, geography, and other job-related factors.

Benefits:

• Competitive benefits and paid time off
• Paid family and disability leave
• 401(k) plan, including employer match (100% vested)
• Educational and professional development financial assistance
• Employee referral bonus program

About Us:

Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC (KBRA) is a full-service credit rating agency registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as an NRSRO. Kroll Bond Rating Agency Europe Limited is registered as a CRA with the European Securities and Markets Authority. Kroll Bond Rating Agency UK Limited is registered as a CRA with the UK Financial Conduct Authority pursuant to the Temporary Registration Regime. In addition, KBRA is designated as a designated rating organization by the Ontario Securities Commission for issuers of asset-backed securities to file a short form prospectus or shelf prospectus.