Overview: Serve as a strategic partner to the Chief Operating Officer and Business Architect, driving operational excellence while fostering a culture of collaboration and innovation. This role requires a forward-thinking leader who can navigate the complexities of team dynamics, strategic alignment, and operational effectiveness to propel the organization towards its long-term objectives.

Primary Duties & Responsibilities

Operational Excellence & Execution

• Drive accountability: Track and follow up on COO commitments, priorities, and deadlines across the function.

• Operational Cadence: Coordinate stand-ups, leadership team meetings, quarterly business reviews, and steering committees to ensure effective operations.

• Issue resolution: Surface bottlenecks and risks early, propose solutions, and coordinate cross-functional fixes. Cascade information, up, down and around the organization to ensure speed and a cohesive operating rhythm.

• Decision support: Ensure COO has the right briefings, data, analysis, and pre-reads to make timely, informed decisions.

• Strategic and Operational Planning: Collaborate with the Strategy Office and the Office of the CEO to align operational plans with the company's strategic vision. Ensure the COO is consistently informed about KPIs, progress, risks, and potential roadblocks.

• Budgeting and Financial Planning: Coordinating planning and budgeting processes, ensuring alignment with strategic priorities and operational goals.

Strategic Alignment & Prioritization

• Translate strategy to execution: Deconstruct COO’s strategic goals into clear initiatives with milestones.

• Portfolio Management: Partner with cross-functional leaders to ensure team initiatives are sequenced, resourced, and delivering value. Facilitate functional Monthly Business Reviews (MBRs) to assess progress, align on priorities, and adjust strategies as needed to enhance overall portfolio performance.

• Clarity of Focus: Assist the COO in prioritizing high-impact initiatives by effectively evaluating and deprioritizing low-value tasks, ensuring sustained attention on the most critical priorities.

• Foresight & trends: Monitor tech/digital trends and competitors; brief COO on implications for strategy.

Leadership Team Effectiveness

• Team alignment: Facilitate COO leadership team effectiveness (e.g., offsites, operating norms, talent discussions).

• Information flow: Ensure the right information gets to and from the COO, reducing churn, while increasing speed and a cohesive operating rhythm.

• Talent lens: Partner with Sr. HRBP to assess talent readiness, succession, and leadership dynamics

• Culture Carrier: Reinforce the COO’s leadership style and priorities across the organization. Lead change management efforts within the function to ensure smooth transitions and adoption of new processes, fostering a resilient and adaptive organizational culture amidst ongoing changes.

Stakeholder & Cross-Functional Management

• Enterprise connector: Coordinate with Finance, HR, Risk, Legal, and other functions to align Tech & Digital with enterprise priorities. Partner with other SLT Chiefs of Staff to coordinate and align strategic initiatives and key SLT priorities and decisions. Participate in weekly SLT COS meetings.

• Board Prep: Draft materials, talking points, and executive updates that showcase progress and challenges.

• External visibility: Support COO in thought leadership, vendor/partner relationships, and industry engagements.

Strategic Executive Support & Optimization

• Time optimization: Manage COO’s calendar, ensuring the right balance of strategic vs. operational work.

• Voice amplification: Partner with HR and communications (all-hands, exec updates, keynotes) to keep messaging consistent.

• Trusted sounding board: Provide honest feedback, challenge assumptions, and offer alternative viewpoints.

Qualifications:

• Minimum of 12 years' business leadership experience, with proven leadership skills across diverse, cross-functional teams.

• Superior interpersonal skills to lead groups and build strong relationships at all levels.

• Extensive experience in strategic planning, portfolio and project management, and leading multiple complex projects with organization-wide impact.

• Strong business acumen and strategic thinking skills, with the ability to translate goals into actionable business plans.

• High integrity and discretion with confidential information.

• Strong organizational skills, capable of handling competing demands and working under tight deadlines.

• Proficiency in problem-solving, critical thinking, facilitation, and team-building skills.

• Demonstrated learning agility and the ability to identify future trends and practices.

• Demonstrated organizational agility to work across organizational boundaries, influence, and collaborate with all levels on solutions that benefit the organization.

• Interpersonal savvy and comfort interacting with and presenting to all levels of the organization, including senior leaders.

• High degree of self-motivation with leadership and initiative in sharing information, contributing towards group goals, and accepting responsibility for results.

• Proactive and an ability to anticipate needs for a range of broad / complex business problems and staying ahead of them; comfortable working in an ambiguous environment.