Operations Director

job description

Our client is a commercial archive agency bringing remarkable and rare archive footage to exciting global productions. They are currently looking for an exceptional Operations Director to join their growing team.
Based in Hoxton, their collections span the world and tell a century of stories with a particular focus on high quality locations from 70s New York to 90s Tokyo and subcultures from early hippies to acid house.
We are looking for an experienced Operations professional with excellent people and communication skills. The ideal candidate will have proven success in managing teams, meeting business objectives with a strong background in either archive research, digitisation or managing digital assets.

Key Responsibilities

• Setting clear, achievable team goals based on overall business objectives and motivating the team to meet these
• Coordinating and supervising the work of a small team made up of Archive Researchers, Content Team members and Archive Operatives
• Promoting a culture of conscientiousness, enthusiasm, accountability and openness throughout the team
• Regularly and accurately reporting on departmental performance to founders and managing capacity
• Regularly evaluating the efficiency of Operations systems and processes according to company objectives and applying improvements
• Setting up, testing and implementing new systems and processes

Role Tasks

• Leading the team, analysing progress, providing feedback and guidance, and making adjustments as needed to stay on track.
• Liaising with co-founders to make decisions for operational activities, and setting strategic goals
• Planning and monitoring the day-to-day running of the department to ensure smooth progress, raising issues and identifying solutions in a timely manner
• Acting as an internal consultant – identifying problems, designing and then implementing solutions
• Recruitment and onboarding of new team members.
• Troubleshooting of film scanner and other technical equipment
• Ad hoc cover for roles across the department
• Management of metadata quality, responsible to maintain best practices and continuously improve search data quality

Skills and Experience - Essential

• A minimum of 5 years experience managing teams
• Ability to identify key metrics and report on departmental performance accurately
• Experience setting up, testing and refining new processes
• Outstanding decision making and problem-solving skills
• Organised and hardworking with a strong ability to prioritise
• Proven ability to succeed in a demanding and fast-paced environment
• A people person with effective and confident communication skills
• Ability to show initiative and proactively engage in implementing solutions
• An agile, hands-on, collaborative approach to working with new ideas and processes, readily accepts feedback and seeks out others’ viewpoints
• Desire to learn and become expert in digitisation technologies

PLUS a minimum of 2 of the below!

• Management experience in a commercial film library or post production lab
• Archival footage research experience either within a library or archive researcher or producer for documentaries
• Digitisation experience – scanning film formats 35mm, 16mm, Super 8 etc, tape digitisation of formats such as Digibeta, U-matic, Beta SP, VHS working quickly to output targets
• Experience with Digital Asset Management systems
• Application of metadata and responsibility for improving metadata and search
• Digital delivery of footage to meet tight deadlines

Please note due to the volume of applications, we will only be able to respond to applicants who have been shortlisted.