Head of Customer & Business Support Operations

takealot.com, a leading South African online retailer, is looking for a highly talented Head of Customer & Business Support Operations to join our team in Cape Town.

We are a young, dynamic, hyper growth company looking for smart, creative, hard- working people with integrity to join us. We offer a market related, Total Remuneration Package which allows full flexibility according to your needs, a great work environment and a promise that you won’t be bored as long as you are prepared for a challenge and want to build something great.

This position reports into the Group Head of Customer & Business Support Operations.

Purpose

The company vision, values and culture are understood, communicated and positively promoted. Be an inspiring leader who can build high morale for all Customer Service Managers, Customer Service Team Leaders and Representatives by providing consistent support and strong positive leadership.

Your Responsibilities will include:

• Promote and reinforce the company vision, values and culture.
• Lead, coach and inspire Customer Service Managers, Team Leaders and Representatives.
• Proactively analyse industry trends and make recommendations to the Head of Customer Experience.
• Develop key metrics and performance indicators to measure customer experience and financial performance.
• Introduce effective change management controls within a fast-paced and evolving environment.
• Identify opportunities to improve productivity across the business.
• Oversee the end-to-end management of the Takealot and Superbalist, including future call centre initiatives.
• Drive the career development of Customer Service Managers through coaching, stretch objectives and ongoing training.
• Build a scalable and sustainable management structure.
• Foster a culture of continuous improvement through daily and weekly operational meetings.
• Partner with Customer Service Managers to achieve divisional OKRs while ensuring consistency in training, processes and performance.
• Drive operational efficiencies using insights gathered from Customer Service Agents.
• Own weekly, monthly and bi-annual reporting and dashboard management, including productivity, response times, CSAT, NPS and other operational metrics.
• Manage the full divisional budget.
• Plan staffing and resource requirements to support business growth and strategic initiatives.
• Plan, implement and evaluate operational initiatives that improve the customer experience.
• Manage third-party providers, communication systems and telephonic platforms to ensure excellent customer service delivery.
• Stay informed of industry developments and customer experience trends.
• Deliver a high-performing customer service operation across all brands.
• Improve customer experience through continuous operational enhancements.
• Achieve divisional OKRs and productivity targets.
• Maintain strong customer satisfaction metrics (CSAT, NPS and service levels).
• Deliver accurate operational reporting and business insights.
• Effectively manage budgets and workforce planning.
• Develop high-performing Customer Service Managers and leadership teams.
• Drive operational efficiency and scalable growth across the contact centre environment.

Attributes Required:

• Excellent analytical and reporting skills.
• Strong communication skills with the confidence to express ideas and opinions.
• Strong interpersonal and relationship-building skills.
• Leadership and people management.
• Performance management.
• Budget management.
• Workforce planning.
• Operational excellence.
• Change management.
• Continuous improvement.
• Strategic thinking.
• Data-driven decision making.
• Customer experience management.

Qualifications and Experience

• Bachelor's Degree or Advanced Diploma.
• MBA (Preferred)
• Minimum 5–7 years' overall experience.
• At least 5 years' experience in a Customer Service Operations Management role.
• Proven experience managing large-scale customer service operations.
• Demonstrated success leading projects that improve customer support processes.

The Environment:

• takealot.com employees are entrepreneurial and dynamic, smart, customer-centric, fun and have the shared ambition of takealot.com being the leading e-commerce company in Africa.
• We have fun, work hard, take ownership, work in teams to create solutions, and are always open to direct feedback/new ideas on where we can improve.
• We are short on ego and high on output.
• We are doers and not only thinkers, its all in the execution after all.
• We love what we do and what we are creating.

We seek to Employ an Extra Ordinary Mind who:

• is respectful but forthright

• is an expert at doing, who can not only design but also execute

• is analytical, able to use data to make decisions

• is competitive, self-directed and strive to be the BEST (GREAT requires a lot of work and does not only happen during business hours

• is passionate about the potential of e-commerce and delivering a world-class customer experience

• is entrepreneurial, thrives under change and accepts it is a constant and always looks for solutions to do something better and faster

• is business SMART. Able to think about problems from a business perspective using technical and product input;

• is curious and challenge the status quo

• is innovative and enjoys iteration

• is collaborative

• will be at the cutting edge of developing new concepts for takealot.com

• thinks like an owner of the business

• is SMART, has INTEGRITY and is HARD WORKING

• If you meet the above you are an Extraordinary Mind so come and join us!

• Takealot is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We encourage applicants from the previously disadvantaged groups and people with disabilities, to apply.