Customer Operations - Lead
About the Role:
As the Customer Operations Lead at Ethos, you will lead a team of up to 10 -12 Associates, ensuring they deliver an exceptional experience to new and existing customers and the insurance agents who refer business to Ethos. You will combine hands-on customer support leadership with team management, coaching, and process improvement to drive team performance and customer satisfaction.This role requires strong people-leadership skills alongside the deep product, systems, and communication expertise expected of frontline associates.Creating a positive customer and agent experience is critical to Ethos's success in the life insurance industry, and this role is central to scaling that experience through a high-performing team.
Duties and Responsibilities:
Team Leadership & People Management
- Directly manage, coach, and develop a team of up to 10 Customer Operations Associates
- Conduct regular 1:1s, performance reviews, and career development conversations
- Set individual and team goals aligned with broader Customer Operations objectives, and track progress against defined service levels (SLAs)
- Manage team scheduling, staffing coverage, and workload distribution across email, live chat, SMS, and phone channels
- Recruit, onboard, and train new team members; build and maintain onboarding/training materials
- Foster a positive, accountable, and high-performance team culture
Operational Excellence
- Ensure the team maintains accuracy in all communications with customers/agents on policy /agent comp related queries
- Own team-level quality assurance — audit interactions, provide feedback, and drive continuous improvement in service quality
- Monitor team metrics (response times, resolution rates, CSAT/agent satisfaction, SLA adherence) and report performance to management
Process & Cross-Functional Collaboration
- Identify opportunities for process improvements across the team's functions and lead implementation of agreed-upon solutions
- Partner with other cross-functional teams to resolve systemic issues and represent the voice of the customer/agent
- Develop and maintain team knowledge base, playbooks, and SOPs to ensure consistency and scalability
- Support hiring, capacity planning, and resource forecasting as the team grows
Subject Matter Expertise
- Maintain and deepen expert-level understanding of Ethos products, consumer policy systems, and partner agent systems
- Serve as the team's go-to resource for complex queries/scenarios
Qualifications and Skills:
3-5+ years of experience in customer support, customer success, or operations, including at least 1-2 years in a team lead, supervisor, or people management role
Proven experience managing and developing a team of 5+ direct reports
Experience in life insurance or a related industry strongly preferred
Bachelor's degree preferred
Proficiency with Salesforce or equivalent support/help desk software; experience with reporting/dashboarding tools a plus
Strong analytical skills with the ability to interpret team performance data and translate it into action
Excellent coaching, feedback delivery, and conflict-resolution skills
Adaptable and resilient, able to lead a team through change while maintaining quality and morale
Excellent phone presence, written communication, and cross-functional collaboration skills
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