Operations Director – IT MSP in Hampshire, Portsmouth

Operations Director – IT MSP Location – Southampton
My client, an established and trusted IT Managed Services Provider have an urgent requirement for an experienced Operations Director to join and lead the team based at their beautifully refurbished offices in the Southampton area
My client is an ISO accredited managed IT support company based in Southampton, Hampshire providing IT support, Cyber Security, VoIP and Cloud services to businesses across the South Coast and beyond.
The Role
The Operations Director serves as the strategic lead, driving operational excellence, commercial efficiency, and scalable growth across all service delivery divisions. This role bridges the gap between senior strategy and day-to-day execution, ensuring the MSP hits target utilisation rates, maintains stringent SLAs, and protects service delivery margins. From a team management perspective the role is very hands-on and focused at developing the team to excellent standards, both technically and commerciality.
After building the business from the ground up, The owner and current Director is looking to take more of a “back seat” whilst still being on hands-on to support the successful candidate with the transition.
Key Responsibilities & Deliverables
Strategic Execution & Leadership Collaborate with the MD/Co-Directors to turn long-term corporate strategy into clear, accountable team workflows.
Act as the operational filter for the executive team, owning challenging internal conversations and maintaining department accountability.
Cultivate a customer-centric, high-performance IT operations culture across the UK business.
Service Delivery & Metric Management Own and manage operational KPIs across Service Desk, Tier 2/3 Support and Professional Services (Project Delivery).
Drive accountability for time-logging and engineer utilisation rates to maximise profitabilit
Oversee the end-to-end client onboarding and project delivery cycles, eliminating friction points between sales handovers and service engineering.
Data-Driven Continuous Improvement Translate complex operational data into actionable, measurable business changes.
Regularly build, present, and implement business cases for internal tool upgrades, automations, and structural overhauls—explicitly mapping out effort vs. financial impact.
Risk, Governance & Vendor Relations Ensure all IT operations adhere to strict UK information governance standards, security best practices, and data compliance protocols (UK GDPR / ICO regulations).
Manage critical relationships and tier-1 vendor contracts (e.g., Microsoft, distributors, hardware suppliers) to negotiate preferential operational terms.
Key Skills and Experience
MSP Sector Expertise
- Minimum of 5+ years of senior operational leadership specifically within an IT Managed Service Provider.
Data Analytics Proficiency
- Proven track record of building and managing operations through data; specific experience utilizing Power BI or similar business intelligence tools to analyse engineer utilisation, ticket trends, and operational blockages.
People and Team Performance Management
(KPI's SLA's Training, Motivating, Hiring & Firing)
Commercial Sharpness
- Deep understanding of core MSP metrics, including engineer utilisation, SLA compliance, gross margin per client, and \"quote-to-cash\" flow.
Education & Certifications
(Desirable) Bachelor's degree in Business, IT, or related field; ITIL Framework certification, CPIM, or CMI Level 7 leadership qualifications.
My client offers a competitive salary, car allowance and benefits alongside a superb working environment within a friendly, professional and supportive team and there are excellent opportunities for further development within the company including share options, equity and an annual bonus.
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