Director, Operations Strategy & Performance

Location: Atlanta, GA / Hybrid
Engagement: 18-Month Contract
Department: Operations Delivery
Reports To: SVP, Operations Delivery
Role Design: Senior Individual Contributor; No Direct Reports

Role Purpose

Create executive capacity during an 18-month transformation period by integrating performance, priorities, and dependencies across Operations Delivery and leading the Operations Delivery business workstream for the US CRM transformation. The role connects cross-functional insight and execution without assuming ownership of functional operations.

Job Summary

This is an 18-month contractor assignment created to provide dedicated senior capacity through a critical period of CRM transformation and cross-functional operational change. The Director, Operations Strategy & Performance provides the SVP with an integrated, decision-ready view of Operations Delivery performance, priorities, risks, and dependencies while coordinating the cross-functional work required to move agreed priorities into execution.

A core element of the assignment is day-to-day business leadership of the US CRM transformation for Operations Delivery. Working under the SVP’s executive sponsorship, the contractor will represent the integrated Operations Delivery business position across Sales, Service, Billing, and Operations Support, ensuring business requirements, operating-model decisions, readiness, adoption, and benefits are connected and progressed.

The assignment operates through integration, influence, and delegated authority. Functional Directors continue to own their people, performance, processes, controls, budgets, and delivery commitments. The contractor creates the cross-functional view, drives resolution where multiple functions are involved, and escalates material business decisions to the SVP.

Primary Accountability 1: CRM Business Leadership

• Day-to-Day Business Leadership: Lead the Operations Delivery business workstream for CRM on behalf of the SVP, providing a single business interface into the program across Sales, Service, Billing, and Operations Support.

• Business Requirements: Own the consolidation, prioritization, and traceability of Operations Delivery business requirements, ensuring functional requirements are reconciled into a coherent end-to-end business position before entering program decision forums.

• Business Decisions and Escalation: Drive timely resolution of cross-functional business questions within delegated authority, maintain visibility of open decisions and trade-offs, and escalate matters requiring executive, investment, risk, or strategic decisions to the SVP.

• Operating-Model Design: Lead definition of the Operations Delivery operating-model implications of CRM, including customer journeys, colleague workflows, roles, handoffs, service models, controls, data needs, and performance measures, with functional owners accountable for the design and delivery of their respective areas.

• Business Representation in Solution Design: Represent the agreed Operations Delivery business position in CRM design and governance forums, test proposed solutions against business outcomes and operational requirements, and ensure unresolved gaps are surfaced for decision. Technology teams retain accountability for architecture, configuration, and engineering.

• Integrated Readiness: Own the consolidated Operations Delivery CRM readiness view, including dependencies across people, process, data, controls, communications, training, and implementation. Functional owners remain accountable for completing the readiness activity within their areas.

• Adoption and Implementation Outcomes: Define how successful operational adoption will be measured, monitor adoption and early-life performance, and coordinate corrective action where outcomes or customer and colleague experience are off track.

• Benefits Realization: Establish the Operations Delivery benefits framework and baselines for CRM, connect benefits to accountable functional owners, and track evidence of value realization following implementation.

• Executive Decision Support: Provide the SVP with concise recommendations on CRM scope, priorities, business trade-offs, risks, investment implications, and decisions requiring executive sponsorship.

Primary Accountability 2: Operations Strategy & Enterprise Integration

• Integrated Performance Insight: Synthesize existing Sales, Service, Billing, and Operations Support performance, customer, financial, risk, and delivery insight into one Operations Delivery view. Source reporting and functional MI remain with the teams accountable for producing them.

• Strategy-to-Execution: Translate agreed Operations Delivery priorities into an integrated roadmap, linking cross-functional milestones, outcomes, and dependencies and highlighting where delivery plans collide or require leadership intervention.

• Leadership Governance: Design and run the cross-functional Operations Delivery leadership cadence, focused on decisions, commitments, dependencies, and escalation rather than recreating functional governance.

• Cross-Functional Dependency Resolution: Coordinate resolution of issues spanning more than one Operations Delivery function, making ownership explicit and ensuring underlying delivery remains with the accountable functional leader.

• Transformation Portfolio Integration: Connect material transformation activity to Operations Delivery priorities, capacity, readiness, and operational impacts, providing the SVP and Directors with visibility of cumulative change and competing dependencies.

• Executive Decision Support: Turn distributed operational and transformation information into clear options, implications, and recommendations so the SVP can make timely decisions while retaining executive accountability.

Decision Rights and Role Scope

• Leads: Operations Delivery business leadership for CRM; integrated Operations Delivery governance; cross-functional synthesis of performance, priorities, risks, and dependencies; and coordination of enterprise-level actions and decisions.

• May Decide: Matters explicitly delegated by the SVP and coordination choices that do not change a functional Director’s accountability, budget, people, controls, or committed outcomes.

• Recommends / Escalates: Material changes to strategy, investment, CRM scope, risk acceptance, operating model, functional priorities, or trade-offs between functions.

• Does Not Own: Functional operations, people leadership, source reporting or MI production, functional risk administration, functional change execution, CRM program management, technical architecture, configuration, or engineering.

• Functional Directors Remain Accountable For: Their people, budgets, performance, controls, processes, and delivery commitments, including the functional work required to implement CRM successfully.

• SVP Remains Accountable For: Operations Delivery outcomes, executive sponsorship of CRM, material strategic and investment decisions, and matters outside delegated authority.

Key Measures of Success

• CRM has one clear Operations Delivery business position, with requirements, decisions, and cross-functional trade-offs progressed at pace.

• The SVP operates at executive sponsor level while the contractor provides effective day-to-day Operations Delivery business leadership of CRM.

• CRM operating-model impacts, readiness dependencies, and functional ownership are identified early and managed to implementation.

• CRM adoption and benefits are evidenced against agreed business outcomes after implementation.

• Operations Delivery has a concise, decision-ready view of cross-functional performance, priorities, risks, and dependencies.

• Cross-functional issues are resolved at the appropriate level without duplicating functional work or weakening Director accountability.

• The 18-month assignment leaves sustainable governance, decision, and benefit-tracking disciplines embedded with the accountable permanent teams.

Key Relationships

• SVP, Operations Delivery: Executive sponsor and accountable leader; sets direction, delegates defined decisions, and receives decision-ready recommendations and escalations.

• Sales, Service, Billing, and Operations Support Directors: Functional owners who provide requirements, insight, resources, and delivery. This role integrates their inputs and coordinates cross-functional decisions without replacing their accountability.

• CRM Program and Transformation Leadership: Partner on program scope, plan, governance, and dependencies while this role represents and leads the Operations Delivery business position.

• Product, Technology, Data, and Architecture: Partner on solution choices, data needs, and dependencies, with technical and platform accountabilities retained by the relevant owners.

• Finance, Risk, Compliance, and Legal: Partner on benefits, investment, controls, regulatory requirements, and customer outcomes relevant to CRM and Operations Delivery decisions.

Required Experience and Capabilities

• Senior experience integrating complex operations in insurance, financial services, or another regulated service environment.

• Demonstrated business leadership of a significant CRM, digital, or technology-enabled transformation, including requirements, operating-model design, readiness, adoption, and benefits realization.

• Strong operational and commercial judgment, with the ability to lead through influence and distinguish cross-functional integration from functional ownership.

• Ability to synthesize operational, customer, financial, and risk information into concise executive recommendations.

• Proven ability to influence senior functional, transformation, and technology leaders without relying on direct authority.

• Strong governance and decision discipline, including escalation, trade-off management, and benefits realization.

• Exceptional written, verbal, and facilitation skills for senior audiences.

• Comfort operating in a time-bound contractor assignment, establishing momentum quickly and leaving sustainable ownership and working practices with permanent teams.

Candidate Profile

The successful contractor will be a senior individual contributor who is equally credible in operations and transformation. They will be able to establish credibility quickly, lead the business side of a major CRM transformation, integrate competing functional requirements, and create clarity across a senior leadership team without becoming an additional layer of functional management.

Their value over the 18-month assignment will come from judgment, pace, influence, and the ability to convert distributed information into coordinated decisions and measurable outcomes while leaving sustainable ownership with the permanent organization.