L2 Application Support Engineer

The L2 Application Support Engineer is a critical role within the Production Support and Operations team. This individual is responsible for providing high-quality technical support, troubleshooting, and incident resolution for complex enterprise applications and platforms. Acting as the bridge between L1 Helpdesk/Monitoring teams and L3 Development/Engineering groups, the L2 Engineer ensures system availability, stability, and adherence to strict Service Level Agreements (SLAs) in a fast-paced, enterprise technology environment. Key Responsibilities 1\. Incident & Problem Management * Escalation Handling: Acknowledge and own incidents escalated by the L1 support team or monitoring alerts. * Troubleshooting & Diagnosis: Perform in-depth technical analysis and root cause investigation of application, database, middleware, and infrastructure failures. * Workaround Implementation: Apply approved temporary workarounds or permanent hotfixes to restore services quickly and minimize business impact. * Collaboration: Partner with L3 developers, database administrators (DBAs), network engineers, and system administrators to resolve complex, multi-tiered issues. * Incident Lifecycle Management: Track and document all incident progression within the ITSM platform (e.g., ServiceNow) from creation through to resolution. 2\. Monitoring, Observability & Preventive Maintenance * System Monitoring: Actively monitor application health, batch jobs, integration feeds, and system performance using enterprise observability suites. * Proactive Interventions: Identify recurring patterns, error trends, or capacity bottlenecks and initiate preventative actions. * Health Checks: Perform daily health checks, start-of-day (SOD) and end-of-day (EOD) verifications, and batch processing runs. 3\. Release, Deployment & Configuration Management * Deployment Validation: Support the verification of application deployments, system patches, and infrastructure upgrades during maintenance windows. * Configuration Controls: Maintain and update application configuration files, environment variables, and parameter settings under strict change management processes. * Environment Management: Assist in maintaining non-production (UAT/Staging) and production environments to ensure consistency. 4\. Communication & Stakeholder Management * Status Updates: Provide clear, timely, and precise communications to business stakeholders, product owners, and technology leadership during critical (Sev-1/Sev-2) incidents. * Bridges & War Rooms: Participate in or lead technical incident bridges to coordinate restoration efforts. * Post-Incident Reviews: Contribute technical inputs to Post-Incident Reviews (PIRs) and Root Cause Analysis (RCA) documentation. 5\. Documentation & Knowledge Management * Runbooks & SOPs: Document and update Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), application architecture maps, and troubleshooting runbooks. * Knowledge Sharing: Train L1 teams on common issue resolution paths to shift-left workloads and improve first-contact resolution rates. Required Technical Skills * Scripting & Automation \- Proficiency in writing and debugging Shell scripting (Bash), PowerShell, or Python to automate daily tasks and analyze log files. * Databases & Querying \- Strong SQL skills (Oracle, MS SQL, Sybase, or PostgreSQL). Ability to write complex select queries, joins, analyze execution plans, and run database scripts. * Middleware & Web Servers \- Working knowledge of Apache, Tomcat, Nginx, WebSphere, and messaging queues like IBM MQ, RabbitMQ, or Apache Kafka. * Cloud & Containerization \- Familiarity with Docker, Kubernetes, OpenShift, or cloud infrastructure (AWS/Azure) concepts and container deployments. * Monitoring & Logging \- Hands-on experience with tools such as Splunk, ELK Stack, AppDynamics, Dynatrace, Grafana, or ITRS Geneos. * ITSM & Collaboration \- Experience with ticketing tools like ServiceNow or Jira, and version control systems like Git or Bitbucket. Required Professional & Soft Skills * Analytical Mindset: Excellent logical reasoning and problem-solving skills; ability to systematically break down a complex issue. * Communication: Exceptional verbal and written communication skills, with the ability to translate technical details into plain language for business teams. * Pressure Tolerance: Calm demeanor under pressure, especially during high-severity system outages. * Team Collaboration: Ability to work cohesively in a global, distributed cross-functional environment. Qualifications & Experience * Education: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related technical discipline. * Experience: 5+ years of experience in an application support, technical support, or systems engineering role (preferably in an enterprise or financial services environment). * Certifications (Desirable): * ITIL v3 or v4 Foundation certification. * Professional certifications in AWS/Azure, Kubernetes (CKAD), Linux Administration, or Oracle/SQL. \------------------------------------------------------ ## Job Family Group: Technology \------------------------------------------------------ ## Job Family: Applications Support \------------------------------------------------------ ## Time Type: Full time \------------------------------------------------------ ## Most Relevant Skills Please see the requirements listed above. \------------------------------------------------------ ## Other Relevant Skills For complementary skills, please see above and/or contact the recruiter. \------------------------------------------------------ Citi is an equal opportunity employer, and qualified candidates will receive consideration without regard to their race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, status as a protected veteran, or any other characteristic protected by law. 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