Head of Customer Operations

UAB-Online; Mijdrecht; On-site; EUR 110,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

UAB-Online in the Netherlands seeks a Head of Customer Operations to lead the department combining Customer Support, Implementation, and Customer Success.

You will build a high-performing team, guide client implementations end-to-end, and ensure value delivery through strong governance and collaboration with Product, Engineering, and Sales.

Qualifications

• Proven leadership of multidisciplinary customer-facing teams.
• Experience delivering software implementations end-to-end.
• Strong communication and stakeholder management in English.

Responsibilities

• Lead and develop the Customer Operations department (Support, Implementation, Customer Success).
• Own portfolio oversight, priorities, and governance for client projects.
• Represent the company in steering committee meetings and ensure alignment among stakeholders.
• Oversee handovers between Sales, Implementation, and Customer Success; manage escalations and incidents.
• Provide senior oversight for complex or high-risk implementations and report portfolio health.

Job description

As Head of Customer Operations at UAB-Online, you lead the department that brings together Customer Support, Implementation, and Customer Success. You are responsible for building a high-performing team that delivers successful client implementations, dependable support, and lasting customer value.

Your primary responsibility is to lead and develop the department. You provide direction, set priorities, coach team members, and create the structure and collaboration needed for the department to perform consistently. Alongside this, you personally lead a selected number of client implementations, from discovery and planning through configuration, testing, training, go-live, and handover, with scope and workload aligned to the department’s priorities and capacity.

You maintain a clear overview of all active implementations and customer projects. You understand their status, risks, dependencies, capacity requirements, and financial impact, and intervene early when delivery is at risk. For strategic and complex projects, you represent UAB-Online in steering committee meetings and ensure that decisions are made, commitments are clear, and stakeholders remain aligned.

In this role, you are an important link between our clients and the internal Product, Engineering, Sales, and management teams. You translate operational insights into clear priorities, handle escalations decisively, and continuously improve the way UAB-Online implements its software, supports customers, and develops long-term customer relationships.

What you can expect

As Head of Customer Operations, you will have the opportunity to build and develop the department, shaping how Customer Support, Implementation, and Customer Success work together. You will help translate UAB-Online’s business priorities into clear team structures, consistent ways of working, and effective customer delivery, within the company’s standards and policies.

The role combines people leadership, portfolio oversight, and hands-on project delivery, with leading and developing the department as your primary focus. You will see the direct impact of your work in a stronger team, successful implementations, and the value customers gain from our platform. Alongside your leadership responsibilities, you will personally lead selected client implementations, with scope and workload aligned to the department’s priorities and capacity.

Your work will include:

• Building, leading, and developing the multidisciplinary Customer Support, Implementation, and Customer Success department in line with UAB-Online’s business priorities
• Setting clear objectives, priorities, roles, and performance expectations for the team
• Coaching and developing team members through regular one-to-ones, feedback, and professional development
• Building a strong team culture based on ownership, collaboration, transparency, customer focus, and continuous improvement
• Managing workforce and capacity planning across support, implementation, and customer success activities
• Maintaining oversight of the full portfolio of implementations and customer projects, including scope, planning, milestones, resources, risks, dependencies, and budgets
• Establishing and improving department-level project management practices, reporting rhythms, documentation, and governance in line with company standards and policies
• Personally leading selected client implementations from discovery through go-live and handover, with scope and workload aligned to departmental priorities and capacity
• Providing senior oversight for strategic, complex, or high-risk implementations
• Representing UAB-Online in steering committee meetings and maintaining trusted relationships with senior client stakeholders
• Ensuring effective handovers between Sales, Implementation, Customer Success, and Customer Support
• Overseeing major incidents and escalations, with clear ownership, communication, resolution, and follow-up
• Providing management with a reliable overview of portfolio health, team performance, key risks, and required decisions
• Using project outcomes, support trends, and customer feedback to identify improvements to our platform and ways of working
• Improving processes, tooling, templates, reporting, automation, and documentation so the department can scale effectively

For this role, we are looking for an experienced leader who combines people management with strong project and portfolio management skills. You know how to create structure across multiple teams and projects while remaining close to customers, delivery, and day-to-day operations.

You are comfortable making decisions, addressing difficult situations, and balancing the needs of customers, team members, and the wider business. You create accountability without micromanaging and know when direct intervention is required.

In general, we look for:

• Ownership: you take responsibility for team performance, customer outcomes, and project results
• Genuine communication: you communicate openly, directly, and respectfully, including when expectations or delivery are at risk
• Collaboration: you bring together colleagues from different disciplines and help teams make well-informed decisions
• Leadership: you provide clear direction, coach others, and create an environment in which people can perform and develop
• Customer focus: you understand customer needs while remaining commercially aware and realistic about scope, resources, and commitments
• Adaptability: you remain structured and decisive while adjusting to changing priorities and circumstances
• Integrity and professionalism when handling sensitive customer, employee, and commercial information
• Comfort working in an ISO-certified environment, including ISO 27001 and ISO 9001, and following agreed processes for quality, security, and continuous improvement

For the Head of Customer Operations role, we additionally value:

• Proven experience leading, coaching, and developing a multidisciplinary customer-facing team
• Strong project and portfolio management skills, with experience overseeing multiple complex implementations or customer projects in parallel
• Hands-on experience delivering software implementations end-to-end
• A strong understanding of planning, governance, risk management, resource allocation, budget awareness, and stakeholder reporting
• The ability to quickly establish the true status of a project and turn ambiguity into a practical delivery or recovery plan
• Experience chairing or contributing to steering committee meetings with senior stakeholders
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills at operational, tactical, and strategic levels
• The ability to build trusted client relationships and handle difficult conversations constructively
• A solid understanding of customer support operations and customer success practices
• Affinity with software and IT, including configuration, integrations, testing, deployment, and post-go-live operations
• The ability to work effectively across Product, Engineering, Sales, and management
• Full professional proficiency in English, both spoken and written
• An interest in using AI, automation, and data to improve team effectiveness and customer outcomes

Experience with the following is considered a plus:

• Affinity with the maritime domain; experience in seagoing shipping, terminal operations, or related logistics is a strong plus
• Familiarity with UAB-Online from an end-user or implementation perspective
• Proficiency in Dutch is a strong plus

Working at UAB-Online

This vacancy gives you an impression of the role itself. If you would like to learn more about our team, culture, benefits, office, and hiring process, you can find more information on our careers page.

**We are handling the recruitment for this vacancy ourselves and are not working with external recruitment agencies for this role. Acquisition in response to this vacancy is therefore not appreciated. Unsolicited profiles or proposals will not be considered.**