Director of Service Operations

Understanding Recruitment Ltd; United Kingdom; Hybrid; GBP 100,000 - GBP 125,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading recruitment consultancy is seeking an Interim Director of Service Operations to strategically oversee service operations for a complex organization during a critical transition period. The role requires experienced leadership in service operations, a focus on transition and stabilization, along with expertise in service management practices. The successful candidate will define service operations strategy and lead in delivering effective outcomes while navigating a dynamic environment. The position is partially remote in Hertfordshire, with a duration of 6 months.

Qualifications

• Proven experience in senior service operations leadership.
• Experience in service operations transition and stabilisation.
• Familiarity with enterprise service management tooling.

Responsibilities

• Define and deliver the Service Operations strategy.
• Lead service design, transition, operations, and improvement.
• Own the operational design and performance outcomes.

Skills

Senior Service Operations leadership in complex organisations

Service operations transition and stabilisation programmes

Enterprise service management tooling implementations

ITIL-aligned Service Management

Incident & Major Incident leadership

Change & Release governance

Hybrid resourcing models

Managing service integrators and provider performance

Strong senior stakeholder and executive engagement

Comfortable operating in ambiguous environments

Job description

We are actively looking for an Interim Director of Service Operations to take strategic charge of service operations across a large, complex organisation during a critical period of transition and stabilisation.

A key priority for this interim assignment is to lead a major service operations and tooling transition, shaping the future service model and ensuring a stable, business-focused end-user experience. While commercial and contract management sits elsewhere, this role owns the operational design, readiness, performance and outcomes of the new service.

As the Director of Service Operations you will define and deliver the Service Operations strategy, covering service design, transition, operations and continual improvement, ensuring service management practices are pragmatic, scalable and aligned to business goals.

This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who can step into complexity quickly, create structure at pace, and provide calm, credible leadership through change.

Key Skills & Experience for the Director of Service Operations:

• Senior Service Operations leadership in complex organisations
• Service operations transition and stabilisation programmes
• Enterprise service management tooling implementations
• ITIL-aligned Service Management (pragmatic application)
• Incident & Major Incident leadership
• Change & Release governance
• Hybrid resourcing models (onshore / near-shore / offshore)
• Managing service integrators and provider performance
• Strong senior stakeholder and executive engagement
• Comfortable operating in ambiguous, fast-moving environments

Director of Service Operations

Location: Hertfordshire 2-3 days a week

Duration: 6 months initial

Please apply if you are available to start within 2-3 weeks and have proven experience delivering the above.