Director of Operations

Passport Labs, Inc.•Charlotte, NC

About The Position

As the Director of Operations at Passport, you will be responsible for designing, leading, and scaling the operational backbone that enables Passport’s payments, support, and managed services functions. Reporting directly to the CTO, this role exists to bring operational discipline, efficiency, execution velocity, and reduced vendor dependency to the business. You will own the day to day execution and continuous improvement of Payment Operations, Support Services, and Managed Services, including the strategic decision of what functions should be provided in house versus via third parties. This role is accountable for service quality, operational efficiency, risk reduction, and scalability as Passport continues to grow its customer breadth and depth. You will work closely with Engineering, Product, Client Success, Finance, Sales, and external partners to ensure operational processes are tightly aligned with platform capabilities, regulatory obligations, and customer expectations. This role is central to ensuring Passport operates with the reliability, discipline, and maturity required of a mission critical payments and government technology platform.

Requirements

Proven experience leading complex operational teams in a SaaS, payments, fintech, or government technology environment.
Demonstrated ability to centralize and scale operational functions across multiple disciplines and stakeholders.
Strong operational and technical acumen with the ability to understand how systems, processes, and people interact at scale.
Experience managing third party vendors and transitioning services in house or to 3rd parties when appropriate.
Ability to operate effectively in high accountability, high impact environments where reliability and accuracy are critical.
Excellent communication skills with the ability to engage deeply with technical teams and clearly with executive leadership.
Strong process orientation with a continuous improvement mindset and bias toward measurable outcomes.
Experience partnering closely with engineering and product teams to support platform delivery and operational readiness.
Superior organizational, prioritization, and execution skills.
Bachelor’s degree required.

Nice To Haves

An advanced degree is a plus.

Responsibilities

Own and lead centralized operational functions across Payment Operations, Support Services, and Managed Services.
Provide direct leadership to operational managers and team leads, including Payment Operations and Support Services, and oversight of third party managed service providers.
Define and execute the strategy for in housing operational capabilities currently delivered by third parties where it improves cost, quality, control, or risk posture.
Establish clear ownership, accountability, and escalation paths across all operational workflows impacting payments, customer support, and service delivery.
Drive service maturity through standardization, automation first thinking, and adoption of measurable service management practices across all operational teams.
Own incident, problem, and knowledge management processes related to operational services, ensuring issues are resolved quickly, root causes are addressed, and learnings are institutionalized.
Serve as the senior escalation point for complex or high impact operational issues, balancing client impact, financial risk, regulatory considerations, and internal constraints.
Partner closely with Engineering and Product to ensure operational readiness for new features, platform changes, and payments capabilities.
Define and track operational KPIs related to service quality, throughput, efficiency, accuracy, risk, and scalability, and provide regular reporting to executive leadership.
Lead vendor management for operational service providers, including performance oversight, contract evaluation, and cost optimization.
Develop and grow operational leaders and individual contributors through clear expectations, coaching, and career pathing.
Continuously assess tools, systems, and processes supporting operations, including the responsible application of AI and automation, to drive measurable improvements aligned with company growth and platform evolution.