Interim Operations Manager
KHR - Recruitment Specialists
Location: Chatham
Rate: £31-£32 per hour
Contract: Interim, minimum 3 months, with potential for a permanent opportunity
Hours: Full-time, with flexibility to support a 24/7 operation
Are you an experienced Operations Manager with strong people leadership skills and a background in complex, shift-based or 24/7 environments?
We are seeking a hands-on, credible and confident Interim Operations Manager to lead and strengthen a busy 24/7 operation in Chatham. This is an initial three-month interim assignment, with the potential to transition into a permanent position for the right candidate.
You will play a key role in providing visible leadership, improving management consistency and strengthening operational performance across three essential service areas.
This is a people-focused operational leadership role. You do not need to be a technical expert in every service. Strong operational management, people leadership, and the ability to make a tangible difference quickly matter most.
The Role
Joining an established operation, you will work closely with the existing Shift Manager and wider team, drawing on their technical expertise while providing clear operational oversight, structure and accountability.
Your initial focus will be to understand the operation, identify key priorities and introduce practical improvements that strengthen performance, team engagement and service delivery.
Key responsibilities will include:
- Providing visible and confident leadership across operational teams and shifts.
- Strengthening people management, performance management and management consistency.
- Establishing clear expectations, accountability and effective management routines.
- Managing performance, conduct, attendance and capability issues in partnership with HR.
- Reviewing workforce deployment, shift arrangements and management cover.
- Improving communication and handovers across the 24/7 operation.
- Monitoring performance against KPIs, SLAs and service standards.
- Identifying and managing operational risks, incidents and service issues.
- Maintaining a strong focus on health and safety, safeguarding and service resilience.
- Working collaboratively with technical specialists and internal stakeholders.
- Identifying and embedding practical improvements to service quality, efficiency and customer outcomes.
- The objective is to leave behind stronger management practices, improved operational effectiveness and a clear plan for longer-term improvement.
About You
We are looking for an experienced operational people leader who can establish credibility quickly, take ownership and make a positive impact in an interim environment.
You will ideally have:
- Significant experience managing people within a busy operational service environment.
- Experience leading a 24/7, shift-based, time-critical or similarly complex operation.
- A strong track record of motivating, developing and managing teams.
- Experience coaching and supporting other managers.
- Confidence handling challenging performance and employee relations matters.
- Experience managing service delivery against KPIs, SLAs or defined standards.
- Strong operational judgement and decision-making skills.
- Experience in workforce planning, resource deployment and operational improvement.
- A practical understanding of health and safety, operational risk and safeguarding.
- The ability to work effectively with specialist colleagues without needing to be the technical expert.
- Experience within contact centres, control rooms, customer service, utilities, transport, logistics, security, emergency response, public services, health and care, or other complex operational environments would be relevant.
What We're Looking For
- You will be a visible, approachable and decisive leader who is comfortable getting into the details, tackling challenges and holding people accountable.
- You will be pragmatic, solutions-focused and confident joining an established operation where improvements need to be delivered quickly and sustainably.
This opportunity would suit an experienced interim manager or an operational leader looking to make a meaningful impact, with the potential to secure a permanent position following the initial assignment.
At KHR, we take care to ensure that you are represented as well as possible, so it is worth checking your CV for layout, spelling and grammar as well as making sure it is up to date before you submit. If you feel you need to highlight particular qualifications, skills or relevant experience with regard to a specific role, then please add a cover letter or a preface page. This does not need to be formatted in the same manner. In addition, if your CV is heavy with graphics, etc, please could you also submit a "clean" copy in Word. Thank you.
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