Operational Support Manager
Full time hours
Competitive salary + £5k car allowance + Benefits
Permanent
Remote working + travel throughout the country as and when required to meet operational need
Are you an experienced Project Manager looking for a new opportunity where you can make a difference?
If so, we would love to hear from you!
We are one of the largest independent operators of crematoria in the UK, supported by almost 500 empathetic and dedicated individuals and we are growing.
Like many of our colleagues, you might not have considered our industry before, however it’s an opportunity to become a part of something truly meaningful and significant.
The role
Reporting to the MD – Crematoria & Cemeteries, the Operational Support Manager provides structured central support to Heads of Division, Central Support Functions, Managers and site teams across operational priorities, project delivery and quality standards.
The role acts as the operational gateway for new central initiatives and requests affecting operational teams. It will ensure work is necessary, clearly scoped, appropriately approved, prioritised, timed and resourced before being passed into the business, maintaining a consolidated view of operational workload and change activity and identifying duplication, conflicts, dependencies and capacity risks.
The role will lead selected operational projects from scope and planning through implementation and review, coordinating internal functions, owners, milestones, communications and training to ensure changes are practical, embedded and deliver the intended outcome.
A core focus of the role will be continuous improvement and operational efficiency, identifying and delivering measurable opportunities to reduce variation, simplify processes, remove unnecessary activity, improve productivity and release operational capacity. Improvement activity should demonstrate a clear benefit through improved service and standards, reduced cost, increased efficiency or commercial performance.
The role will also support the Group quality and standards framework through audit coordination, action tracking, lessons learned, customer feedback and complaint themes, process consistency and continuous improvement. It provides coordination, challenge and follow-through; operational line accountability remains with the relevant Head of Division and operational manager
Responsibilities / Accountabilities:
Exceptional Care
- Ensure family care, dignity, safety and service quality remain central to the assessment and delivery of operational projects and change.
- Consider the impact on families, Funeral Directors and site colleagues before operational changes are approved or introduced.
- Use customer feedback, complaints, compliments and service insight to identify themes and improvement opportunities, escalating material risks where required.
- Support consistent application of Westerleigh Group policies, standards and expected behaviours across operational activity.
Central Operations & Project Delivery
- Maintain a single operational workload and change register covering significant central requests, operational projects, launches and implementation activity affecting site and divisional teams.
- Act as the first operational gatekeeper for central requests into Operations, challenging unclear or low-value activity and ensuring each request has a clear purpose, sponsor, owner, scope, priority, timing, resource requirement and expected outcome before progressing.
- Assess new activity against existing operational priorities and capacity, identifying duplication, clashes, dependencies and cumulative workload; recommend where work should be combined, re-sequenced, deferred or stopped.
- Provide support functions and operational leadership with a concise forward view of priorities, key deadlines, risks, decisions and areas requiring intervention.
- Lead selected operational projects and change initiatives, setting clear scope, milestones, responsibilities, risks and measures of success and maintaining disciplined action tracking through to completion.
- Coordinate Operations, IT, HR, Finance, Marketing, Facilities, Development and other support functions where cross-functional input is required, ensuring one joined-up implementation plan for operational teams.
- Ensure appropriate communication, training, guidance and operational readiness are in place before changes are launched to sites.
- Monitor progress, dependencies, risks, actions and decisions, escalating slippage or unresolved issues early and ensuring agreed actions are closed.
- Complete implementation reviews and capture benefits, issues and lessons learned so future projects and changes improve over time.
- Develop and maintain simple, proportionate project templates, operational briefs, trackers and governance routines that improve clarity without creating unnecessary administration.
Continuous Improvement & Operational Efficiency
- Identify and lead practical continuous improvement opportunities across Operations, focused on reducing variation, simplifying processes, removing unnecessary activity and improving consistency of service delivery.
- Work with Heads of Division, Central Support Functions and site teams to identify operational inefficiencies, recurring issues, duplication and unnecessary complexity, translating these into clear improvement actions.
- Ensure improvement activity has a defined purpose, baseline and measurable outcome, with benefits expressed wherever possible through improved service, increased productivity, reduced cost, released capacity, reduced risk or improved commercial performance.
- Review operational processes and ways of working to identify opportunities to standardise activity where this improves efficiency and quality, while retaining appropriate local flexibility.
- Challenge processes, reporting, meetings and administrative activity that do not add sufficient operational value, recommending where activity can be simplified, automated, combined or stopped.
- Support the development and implementation of more efficient working practices, ensuring changes are practical for operational teams and do not compromise exceptional care, safety, compliance or service standards.
- Use operational data, audit findings, customer feedback, complaints, incidents and colleague insight to identify areas of variation and prioritise improvement opportunities.
- Establish appropriate measures for agreed improvement initiatives and track delivery of benefits through to completion, escalating where expected outcomes are not being achieved.
- Undertake post-implementation reviews to confirm whether intended operational, service and financial benefits have been realised and identify any further action required.
- Work with Finance and relevant functional owners where appropriate to quantify efficiencies, cost savings, productivity improvements or commercial benefits arising from operational improvement activity.
- Maintain a prioritised pipeline of operational improvement opportunities, ensuring resources are focused on initiatives with the greatest potential benefit and avoiding unnecessary or low-value change.
- Share successful improvements and best practice across divisions, helping embed a culture of continuous improvement, ownership and disciplined follow-through.
People
- Build trusted working relationships with Heads of Division, Heads of Central Support Functions and Crematorium Managers, providing practical support and constructive challenge.
- Influence without direct line authority, helping teams align behind agreed priorities and resolve competing demands.
- Support operational leaders by reducing avoidable administrative noise and ensuring requests reaching teams are clear, relevant and properly coordinated.
- Coach colleagues in practical project, change and action-management disciplines where this supports stronger delivery.
- Communicate clearly, concisely and consistently, translating complex or cross-functional activity into practical actions for operational teams.
- Work in a style consistent with Westerleigh Group values and behaviours and handle confidential or sensitive information appropriately.
Quality & Standards
- Support and coordinate the operational quality and audit programme, including scheduling, action tracking and follow-up to ensure agreed improvements are implemented and closed.
- Maintain a central view of quality actions and recurring themes from audits, incidents, near misses, complaints and customer feedback, highlighting trends and areas requiring operational focus.
- Develop and maintain a practical lessons-learned process, ensuring learning is shared across divisions and translated into changes to process, guidance or training where appropriate.
- Support the review and consistent application of operational policies, procedures and standards, identifying gaps, duplication or ambiguity and coordinating updates with the relevant subject-matter owner.
- Support operational readiness for internal and external quality, compliance or regulatory reviews and ensure actions are allocated, monitored and completed.
- Develop concise operational quality reporting and KPIs that give leadership a clear view of standards, recurring risks, open actions and improvement progress.
- Promote continuous improvement and best-practice sharing across divisions while ensuring any change remains proportionate and practical for site teams.
About you
Experience
- Experience coordinating or managing operational projects from definition through implementation and review.
- Experience working across multiple functions and stakeholders to deliver business change.
- Experience managing competing priorities, workload plans, action trackers, risks and dependencies.
- Experience supporting quality, compliance, audit or continuous-improvement activity.
- Experience preparing concise reporting for senior operational or leadership teams.
Capability
- Proven experience in a similar role.
- Highly organised, with strong judgement and the ability to prioritise competing demands across multiple workstreams.
- Strong project-management and coordination skills, with disciplined follow-through on actions, milestones, risks and dependencies.
- Able to challenge constructively, make recommendations and protect operational capacity while maintaining positive stakeholder relationships.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to produce clear, concise briefs and management updates.
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, able to interpret operational data and identify themes, risks and practical actions.
- High attention to detail combined with a pragmatic understanding of what is workable in a multi-site operational environment.
- Confident influencing across functions and levels without relying on direct line authority.
- Self-starter who can work independently, exercise sound judgement and escalate appropriately.
- Able to deal sensitively with confidential information and operational issues.
Knowledge
- Working knowledge of project and change-management principles and practical implementation methods.
- Understanding of quality assurance, audit, action management, continuous improvement and lessons-learned approaches.
- Understanding of the demands of multi-site operational delivery and the need to balance control, pace and colleague capacity.
Desirable Experience / Knowledge
- Bereavement-sector or comparable regulated service-sector experience.
- Experience working in or closely with multi-site site operations.
- Knowledge of cremation and cemetery operations, relevant legislation and operational compliance requirements.
- Formal project-management qualification or training, such as APM, PRINCE2 or equivalent.
- Audit, quality-management or continuous-improvement qualification or practical experience.
- Experience supporting new site openings, integrations, technology implementation or other operational change programmes.
What We Offer
If you would like to join the Westerleigh team, you can be sure of a warm welcome, ongoing training and development and a sense of pride by truly making a difference every day to the families we serve. No two days are the same and many of our Managers have developed their careers within the business.
The values we champion are Safety First, Exceptional Care, Uniquely Personal and One Team.
In addition to salary, you will also be eligible for the following benefits: