Head of Service Operations

Head of Service Operations

Company Overview: Network are a well-established service provider specialising in national catering equipment and engineering services, operating as a trusted partner for blue-chip clients across the UK. Working closely with leading manufacturers, the company have an excellent reputation for providing high-quality services and solutions. Employing a large team of field engineers who are trained on a vast range of specialist catering equipment.

Network are part of the Airedale Group which offers a complete end to end solution in providing commercial kitchens across the food service industry. If you are looking for job security and the scope to progress, we offer excellent career opportunities as a rapidly growing group of businesses, employing circa 700 people across the UK.

About the role: We are seeking a commercially minded, results-driven operational leader to lead Network Catering’s back-office, service delivery and customer operations. Reporting to the Director, this role will connect the customer journey from first contact through job creation, scheduling and dispatch, resolution, quoting and final invoicing, ensuring work is delivered efficiently and converted into accurate revenue.

You will be accountable for agreed service, productivity and quality measures, field-demand dispatch efficiency and capacity management, with decisions aligned to business performance and P&L objectives. Using clear management information and root-cause analysis, you will improve workflows, customer satisfaction (CSAT), service quality and commercial outcomes.

You will lead through managers and team leaders, building a culture of ownership, coaching, continuous improvement and operational discipline. You will turn performance insight into focused action plans and measurable, sustained results.

Key Responsibilities

• Own performance across contact centre, back-office and dispatch operations against agreed service levels, KPIs and P&L objectives.
• Translate job volumes and work mix into labour and materials revenue and margin; explain variances to forecast and identify corrective action.
• Maintain oversight of the open-job position, work ageing and flow through the operation, addressing bottlenecks and avoidable delay.
• Provide commercial input to business cases, organisational changes and growth plans, working with the Director and Finance.
• Manage inbound and outbound call performance, queue management and real-time resourcing to maintain service levels through demand peaks and absence.
• Set and maintain standards for job creation, triage and customer communication, using call reviews and job-record checks to improve quality.
• Ensure complaints, escalations and unresolved jobs have clear ownership, agreed timescales and appropriate follow-through to customer resolution.
• Own dispatch efficiency and capacity management, balancing field demand with engineer skills, geography and parts availability.
• Use capacity and demand data to plan resource, with the Resource & Planning specialist, and to flag risk early.
• Work with Regional Managers and Supervisors to resolve conflicts between customer commitments and field capacity.
• Ensure customer portal updates, quotations and invoices are accurate, timely and complete so completed work is converted into revenue without avoidable delay.
• Ensure the team maintain accuracy of customer portal and job-record inputs, including job type and warranty selection, which influence cost and charge.
• Work with parts and logistics owners and Finance on controls that ensure parts used are correctly recorded and charged.
• Track open calls and job ageing, reporting both volumes and associated value where information is available.
• Develop and maintain a live operational scorecard and a consistent cadence of performance reviews across teams.
• Analyse trends, identify root causes and implement targeted action plans, monitoring whether actions deliver the intended result.
• Review workflows and processes to reduce rework, unnecessary hand-offs and activity that adds cost without customer or business value.
• Improve management information and reporting, promoting consistent definitions and a single agreed view of performance.
• Lead, coach and develop Managers and Team Leaders to build leadership capability.
• Establish consistent performance management across the teams, with clear objectives, regular one-to-ones, calibrated quality and productivity measures.
• Build a KPI-led culture in which colleagues understand how their work affects customers and the P&L, with accountability and recognition applied consistently.
• Create a positive, inclusive and resilient team environment that supports wellbeing while maintaining high standards.
• Plan recruitment, onboarding, development and succession in partnership with the Talent Management team to build competencies and career pathways.
• Apply HR policies and procedures fairly and consistently, including absence management, performance improvement, disciplinary, grievance, flexible working and probation processes.
• Address people issues promptly, seeking HR guidance where appropriate, maintaining accurate records and following applicable legislation and ACAS guidance.
• Ensure relevant health and safety, data protection and call-handling compliance requirements are understood and met within the teams.

Experience Required

• Proven experience leading a large, multi-team customer service, contact centre, service desk or back-office operation, including managing managers or team leaders.
• Demonstrable experience leading and motivating teams, setting clear expectations and objectives, managing performance and addressing underperformance effectively and fairly.
• Strong experience in driving processes and improving operational efficiency, ensuring work is completed accurately, consistently and within agreed timescales.
• Experience of resource, capacity and scheduling or dispatch management in a field service, facilities or similar demand-led environment.
• A proactive approach to operational problem-solving, with the ability to identify issues, implement practical solutions and follow through to ensure improvements are achieved and sustained.
• Experience of billing, quoting and customer-portal or CRM processes, and of working with finance to keep them accurate.
• A strong leader who coaches, develops and holds teams to account in equal measure.
• Passionate about service delivery and customer experience.
• Energetic, resilient and decisive, able to prioritise and drive change in a fast-paced operation.
• Build a culture of accountability, continuous improvement and operational excellence while keeping the team engaged.

Details

• Competitive Salary
• Performance Bonus
• Monday – Friday, 8:00 – 17:00
• 23 Days annual leave, increasing to 26 with LOS
• Life Assurance
• Westfield Health insurance, Cash plan & Retail discounts
• Employee Assistance Program
• Pension