WHAT DOES A GLOBAL OPERATIONS DIRECTOR DO?

Published: Apr 18, 2025 - The Global Operations Director leads the implementation of scalable processes, best practices, and commercial frameworks to optimize efficiency, consistency, and business impact across global operations. This position drives cross-functional alignment, project execution, and continuous improvement while fostering collaboration, operational excellence, and a safety-first culture. This role oversees strategic resource planning, talent development, budget forecasting, and the successful execution of Lean methodologies to enhance customer delivery performance.

A Review of Professional Skills and Functions for Global Operations Director

1. Global Operations Director Duties

  • GTM Strategy: Partner closely with the Sales and Marketing leadership teams to align GTM Ops and Strategy.
  • Leadership Development: Lead, inspire, and develop the CS Planning and Operations leaders and their teams to drive innovation to ensure predictable and scalable results that drive growth and improve profitability.
  • Data & Technology: Uncover opportunities to leverage data and technology that will help CS grow non-linearly.
  • KPI Management: Identify, develop, implement and track key performance indicators for the CS teams to ensure targets.
  • Strategy Alignment: Partner with teams to align strategies and best methodologies.
  • Performance Transparency: Identify key performance indicators, shape and align definitions in partnership with multiple operations functions, and drive transparency of results and create action plans for improvements.
  • Supply Chain Governance: Govern the overall performance across the supply chain and design forums, tools, and processes.
  • Analytics Strategy: Partner with operations and technology teammates to develop, govern, and deliver the multi-year analytics roadmap, strategy, and tools including aligning roadmaps and plans to unlock data to strengthen the Converse information ecosystem.
  • Business Solutions: Partner with team members to understand their needs, define key business questions to solve, and develop and implement plans to resolve them.
  • Solution Design: Design solutions including developing tools, data visualizations, and insights.
  • Implementation Leadership: Develop and lead implementation plans and drive adoption of solutions with cross-functional teams.
  • Performance Education: Educate Operations and other business functions on the role of performance management, the strategic plans, and new ways of working.
  • Team Coaching: Lead, coach, and develop a team of two managers to deliver the performance management framework, analytics roadmap, and culture of performance and grow their experience and careers.

2. Global Operations Director Details

  • Operational Excellence: Challenge everything and thrive for operational excellence
  • Data Analysis: Analyze data, benchmark best practices & solutions, provide competitive & technological watch to identify key areas of improvement
  • Team Coordination: Work closely with local and central teams to collect needs & constraints
  • Process Optimization: Understand, challenge and address identified needs, sit with business teams, analyze root causes and identify optimizations, design new processes and roll-out plans
  • Strategic Projects: Take part in strategic/large-scale projects to ensure their success and maximize business impact
  • Project Monitoring: Participate in project design and results monitoring/analysis
  • Stakeholder Coordination: Facilitate coordination with various stakeholders
  • Stream Leadership: Support and Lead streams with analysis, meeting/workshop preparation & animation
  • Problem Solving: Solve problems and escalate to business leaders
  • Knowledge Sharing: Strengthen & scale project management, change management & knowledge sharing practices within the company
  • Team Onboarding: Provide internal teams with optimal onboarding and support to maximize operational efficiency
  • Change Management: Drive change management initiatives to ensure new processes/tools/ best practices adoption and increase communication and knowledge sharing
  • Customer Advocacy: Represent the voice of the customer including btb (restaurants) & btc (users)

3. Global Operations Director Responsibilities

  • Product Lifecycle: Partner closely with the product, design, engineering, business, and corporate planning teams to define and maintain the product delivery lifecycle
  • Cross-functional Communication: Facilitate communication within the Product Division and act as point of contact for all cross-functional stakeholders
  • Agile Processes: Establish agile, iterative product development processes and workflows to enable product and engineering teams to focus on execution
  • Team Coordination: Coordinate and facilitate communication between multiple product and engineering teams to align OKRs and maintain up-to-date roadmaps
  • Roadmap Management: Manage and align the overall product roadmap to support the strategic business objectives, and report to company-level stakeholders
  • Risk Identification: Identify execution risks, roadmap dependencies, and critical path items between different product teams
  • Meeting Documentation: Conduct and document cross-functional meetings to communicate expectations, project roles, status updates (including schedules, milestones, metrics, risks, and issues)
  • Feedback Facilitation: Facilitate product communications and feedback with team members and stakeholders across multiple time zones
  • Project Reporting: Set up and manage project management tools and dashboards to report on project management metrics
  • Event Planning: Plan and execute Product Division all-hands, planning, and offsites for the Product Division
  • Change Management: Act as a change agent to champion, evangelize, and transform product development processes throughout the company

4. Global Operations Director Job Summary

  • Partner Coordination: Serve as a commercial partner coordination point, working closely with Alliance management, internal team members, and senior leaders to manage and advance joint goals and deliverables.
  • Communication Management: Accountable for ensuring seamless communication and execution between commercial teams and broader alliance efforts
  • Alliance Coordination: Lead the coordination of day-to-day commercial alliance activities, ensuring successful execution of deliverables and progress to defined objectives.
  • Operating Norms: Ensure operating norms (e.g. communication, decision making) for commercial partner interactions are established and adhered to
  • Contractual Monitoring: Proactively monitor and communicate commercial contractual obligations and deliverables to relevant stakeholders to ensure responsibilities met in accordance with terms of collaboration
  • Decision Alignment: Partner closely with commercial team members to ensure joint decisions are implemented in alignment with product goals, alliance operating principles, and contractual terms
  • Alliance Consistency: Ensure that commercial elements of alliances are managed consistently with a broad alliance approach, drive implementation of best practices, standard tools, and approaches
  • Process Management: Drive joint commercial process management including proactively identifying potential conflicts and managing issues to resolution while fostering and maintaining collaborative working relationships.
  • Governance Facilitation: Facilitate effective commercial governance and decision making
  • Risk Management: Facilitate the identification, management, and communication of key risks, associated mitigation, contingency plans, and appropriate escalation in partnership with program alliance managers
  • Operational Alignment: Work closely with internal joint committee members, functional leaders, and commercial leadership to ensure ongoing alignment, prepare for key engagements, and manage points of operational friction
  • Project Collaboration: Collaborate with commercial members across the program to develop and maintain high-quality project plans that align with overall program goals and commercialization strategies and drive communication, scenario planning, and decision making accordingly

5. Global Operations Director Accountabilities

  • Process Implementation: Implement stage-appropriate and value-added processes, best practices, commercial frameworks, and appropriate cadences to increase efficiency and consistency of commercial processes/deliverables
  • Project Leadership: Oversee project management leadership and support for key commercial activities including functional sub-teams, working group meetings, commercial launch planning, and various commercial projects
  • Cross-functional Coordination: Coordinate with peers and partners to drive alignment across commercial project managers and broader cross-functional teams throughout all phases of the integrated project plan
  • Relationship Building: Build and leverage relationships and networks across commercial and the broader company to improve and enhance team dynamics
  • Business Optimization: Identifying opportunities and removing obstacles to drive business results
  • Operational Excellence: Contribute to the operational excellence of the commercial department with a focus on continuous improvement
  • Team Development: Build an effective team, attract top-tier talent, and ensure successful development of employees
  • Safety Culture: Promoting and fostering a culture that results in a safe working environment using Newell SEAL safety system.
  • Budget Management: Develop/Execute the reliable operational budgets/forecasts
  • Productivity Delivery: Delivering year-on-year annual productivity objectives
  • Lean Framework: Implementation of Newell’s Lean framework - PEAK
  • Customer Performance: Advancing delivery performance to customers