Vice President, Operations

The future of energy is digitized, decarbonized and localized. At SmartestEnergy, we need revolutionary thinkers to help our customers make the most of this new landscape, thinking differently to find smart solutions to complex problems. 

Formed in 2001, we’re an agile business driven by entrepreneurial thinking. As a subsidiary of the Marubeni Corporation, we also have strong investment and infrastructure behind us. As well as our three offices in the US, we have three offices in the UK and another in Australia.  Further expansion is planned for 2026 and beyond which means global career opportunities for you, with plenty of potential to explore new markets. 

When you join our Team, you will have the opportunity to contribute and make an impact every single day. 

Overview

Reporting to the CEO, the Vice President Operations owns the delivery excellence across all operations that support the company’s retail business, including the Market and Retail Operations Departments. The VP Operations will be instrumental in leading strategic change through the organization. The role provides leadership to our teams, supports the business with strategy, control and insight that ensures we grow and evolve.

The VP Operations owns the customer lifecycle and all systems, people and processes needed to deliver price competitiveness and retail contract profitability in line with the company’s aspirations, market facing activities involving our customers, industry leading customer care and continuous improvement of efficiency and cost to serve.

The role is a member of the SEUS senior management team, sitting on the Company Executive Committee and with overall responsibility for operational excellence, chairs the Operating Committee. Through these roles, the VP Ops has a critical role to play in helping to define and implement business strategy, while shaping and delivering the company’s growth ambitions. The role is also responsible for representing the company and its operations externally with customers, brokers and the industry

In this role, you will be involved with the following:

Own the following functional areas to provide operational excellence throughout the customer lifecycle:

• Sales Support, enrollments, billing, collections, contract enforcement and customer care

• Broker commissions and reporting for all post contract signature activities

• ECI system ownership and operational performance enhancements

Own the following functional areas to deliver industry leading market operations:

• Pricing and structuring of all retail contracts including with responsibility for curve management, component pricing methodology and product structure

• Reconciliation of all energy and non-energy components to ensure the business is pricing to cover costs, including as Chair of the Retail Pricing Performance Committee

• Forecasting and scheduling of customer load and reconciliation of settlement to ensure pricing and forecasting accuracy and the mitigation of imbalance exposure

• HU processing, pricing and engagement with Sales on large/complex deals

• Analysis of market, product and broker feedback to ensure price competitiveness and tracking of retail contract profitability

• Regulatory changes and filings associated with our retail business at utility, state and FERC level

• Ownership of HUMS & SCOPE and their operational performance and enhancement

Strategy and Growth

• Implement systems, processes, reporting and controls to drive efficiency and industry leading operational excellence and customer care

• Develop key metrics to measure success and improve accuracy

• Implement expansion plan in accordance with target operating model

• Create structure to help us manage more effectively and reduce cost to serve

• Support company growth including new business opportunities

• Primary relationship holder with key vendors to support our current business and future growth

Leadership

• Coach, mentor and develop people to be the best they can be

• Develop leaders within the company and setting them on a path for management

• Establish and maintain team focus by developing and communicating goals

• Be a trusted advisor and business partner to the SEUS VP+ community to support their growth and deliver on their business
  

To be successful in this role, you are likely to have the following skills/experience:

•  5-10 years’ experience in management role in the energy industry with particular experience in the fields of Market Operations, Retail Operations or ideally both

• Proven experience as a leader in a rapidly growing company

• Proven experience of delivering transformational business and platform change and delivery of successful outcomes (i.e., seeing through to the end)

• A good understanding of workflow management and how to implement the changes required

• Experience of stakeholder management and presentation to a senior executive community

• Proven experience as a manager responsible for ensuring rigor and discipline in day-to-day business operations

• Previous experience working in a global electricity trading environment highly desirable

• Exceptional leadership skills with the ability to develop and communicate a vision that inspires and motivates

• Strong influencing and stakeholder management skills and a good reader of people

• Ability to instill confidence and build consensus

• Knowledge of the electricity industry/market

• Proven competence in the ability to plan and deliver budgets

• Strong business acumen, including industry, domain-specific knowledge

• Excellent communication skills with the ability to communicate complex proposals to senior decision makers and external stakeholders

• Has vision, perspective, judgment and common sense and can therefore ‘jump in’ without the need for detailed knowledge of the situation.

• Strong critical thinking skills

• Passionate about our business

• Conscientious, empowering and organized and can therefore organize people and resources quickly and efficiently to deliver successful outcomes

• Can communicate, influence, demonstrate good interpersonal sensitivity and is therefore able to work with people effectively as a leader, team worker and/or subordinate

• Resilient and methodical and therefore can make a habit of success
  

Diversity

Celebrating our inclusive and diverse culture is core to what we do. We value everybody irrespective of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, sexual orientation, or gender identity), national origin, age, disability and genetic information (including family medical history). EOE.

We know that for our business to thrive we need diverse talent with a range of backgrounds, skills and capabilities in each of the countries in which we operate. We view diversity as one of the key enablers that helps our business to grow.

We are committed to the full inclusion of all qualified individuals. As such, if a reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, please reach out to the HR & People Team via email [email protected] so we can discuss with you further.

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