Head of Operations

Head of Operations

Wave Group

Competitive Basic Salary + Bonus

Reports to: COO. A path to Chief of Staff. Occasional international travel.

About Wave Group

Wave Global Group is a tech-enabled professional services business with two service engines and a product arm that incubates and owns its software and data assets. Services, software, and data compounding together.

• Wave Talent. UK recruitment and staffing. Permanent and contract technology and digital professionals for VC-backed and enterprise clients. The original and largest revenue engine.
• WaveWorks. SoW-based enterprise consultancy. Multi-workstream technology programmes at seven-figure scale. The growth engine shifting Wave's revenue mix from services to programmes.
• Wave Labs. The group's product and technology arm. Labs incubated and owns the group's two proprietary assets:
• WaveMind. Self-serve AI hiring platform, built on Wave Talent's proprietary candidate universe. A quality-controlled alternative to pure AI hiring tools. The ARR engine.
• Mothership. Internal data lake with LLM copilot capability. Powers Iron Man Suits, candidate matching, financial reporting, and group intelligence. The infrastructure that compounds every year the group exists.

Wave is scaling across the UK, US, and UAE and building toward a meaningful exit. Every role is designed to compound against that trajectory.

The role in one paragraph

This is the operational layer directly beneath the COO. You own the cross-functional projects and infrastructure that sit above associate level but below director level. You protect the founders' time by making sure things land. You're the first port of call for operational problems with no clear owner, and the person who turns the founders' vision into executed reality. You work on a project basis, flexing to whatever matters most that week.

You won't be a specialist in any one function. Instead, you're great at most things and fixated on what unblocks growth: the operational connective tissue across sales, the non-sales functions (finance, commercial, people, and marketing), and Labs. A core part of the job is making those three sides work as one, and keeping Labs connected to the rest of the business rather than running as an island. You won't have every answer, but you're sharp and resourceful enough to find it through research, advisors, suppliers and the team, then execute.

What you own and what success looks like:

The role spans six areas. Each sets out what you own and how we'll know it's working.

1) International expansion (operational)

The operational side of opening and running our UAE and US entities. Entity setup, visas and relocation, banking and commercial infrastructure, and the advisors and suppliers who deliver it. You're the escalation point for international office matters as we go live in new markets, and you keep the founders out of the detail.

Success looks like:

• New entities go live on or ahead of plan, with the right infrastructure from day one.
• Visa, relocation and residency processes run to a clear timeline, not deadline to deadline.
• Advisors and suppliers are held to their commitments. The founders operate across markets without chasing paperwork.

2) Internal systems, tooling and SOPs

The systems the business runs on. You build and maintain the dashboards and reporting leadership relies on. You own the SOPs and documentation around our tooling, so nothing depends on one person's memory. You won't need to be an engineer, but you'll need to build things and get hands-on with tools and AI.

Success looks like:

• Leadership has live, trusted dashboards, not ad hoc spreadsheets rebuilt each time.
• Core tools have clear, current SOPs. Onboarding onto our systems is fast and self-serve.
• Manual, repetitive work gets automated rather than absorbed by headcount. When a process breaks, there's documentation and a named owner: you.

3) Operational bridge across sales, non-sales and Labs

The connective tissue across all three sides of the group. You sit across sales, the non-sales functions (finance, commercial, people, marketing) and Labs, spot where things fall between them, and close the gaps. Labs matters most here. It's building proprietary product at pace and can't run as an island, so you keep the operational, financial and commercial plumbing between Labs and the group connected.

Success looks like:

• Sales, non-sales and Labs run as one engine, not three silos. Items that used to stall now move.
• Labs gets the operational, finance and commercial support it needs without the Director chasing the group. Handovers between functions are clean.
• Leadership decisions are backed by clear data you've pulled together across all three. Issues are surfaced and resolved before they reach the founders.

4) Funding and growth readiness

Supporting the Group Strategy Director as an extension of their work. You coordinate across the group to unblock bottlenecks and get the business investor and growth ready. You pull together the materials and data a raise or transaction needs, and research government schemes, grants and innovation funding. The defining part: thinking 6 to 12 months ahead. You spot issues before they arise and clear the path early.

Success looks like:

• The Group Strategy Director has real leverage, because you carry the coordination and legwork.
• The group moves quickly into a funding conversation, with materials ready rather than scrambled.
• Bottlenecks are cleared before they bite, because you saw them coming. Grant and innovation funding is identified and pursued where eligible.

5) Compliance, governance and risk

The operational gaps in GDPR, data protection, compliance and security. Unglamorous but business-critical, these protect the group as it scales and prepares for any future transaction. You also coordinate equity workstreams such as the EMI scheme, working with the right suppliers and tools, and help open these out globally as we build in the UAE and US.

Success looks like:

• The group reaches and holds clean, audit-ready foundations across data, compliance and records.
• GDPR and data protection obligations are met with documented processes, not workarounds. Equity workstreams are coordinated and kept current.
• Equity provision extends cleanly across the UAE and US as those entities come online. Risks are closed before they become problems or block a transaction.

6) General operational firepower

Being the first port of call for high-level operational tasks with no clear owner, from office moves to one-off strategic projects. You triage, resolve, or route, and cut the operational noise reaching the founders.

Success looks like:

• When something has no owner, it comes to you and gets resolved. The founders don't step in.
• One-off projects land cleanly and on time, whatever they are that quarter.
• The founders' time is visibly protected. The operational noise reaching leadership falls quarter on quarter.

Your first 90 days

The role is broad, but the early priorities are clear. In your first 90 days you take on the operational backbone the business is already carrying.

• International expansion. Pick up the UAE and US entity work and bring it onto a clear, managed timeline.
• Internal systems. Learn what leadership runs on today, then start building the dashboards, SOPs and documentation that remove single points of failure.
• The bridge. Map where things fall between sales, the non-sales functions and Labs, and close the most expensive gaps first.
• Ownership. Become the first port of call for operational items that currently land on the founders.

The remit grows from there. The early focus is taking weight off the founders fast, and proving you can be trusted with it.

Who we are looking for

• Strong academic background. A good degree from a strong university, in a subject that signals range and rigour: Economics, PPE, Engineering, Maths, Law, Business or Management. Intellectual horsepower and how fast you get up to speed matter more than the subject.
• Above average at most things, expert in nothing yet, and energised by that. You connect gaps across sales, non-sales and Labs rather than going deep in one.
• Exceptional execution. You follow through every time. The founders never have to ask twice.
• Genuinely tech and AI literate. You use AI as a primary tool and build dashboards, systems and automations.
• Obsessed with growth and the points that unblock it. You find the constraint and remove it.
• Proactive and resourceful. You don't wait for answers. You find them through research, suppliers, advisors and the team.
• Comfortable moving between strategy and operational detail in the same day, and comfortable with ambiguity. A confident written communicator at every level of seniority.
• Ambitious. You want to operate at founder level now. This role is designed to grow into a Chief of Staff seat as the group scales.

Why this role

• A seat at founder level. Work directly with the CEO and COO of a profitable, fast-growing, tech-enabled group with proprietary product ambition.
• Exposure most people don't get until much later: international expansion, fundraising, equity, board-level operations, and building a company from the inside.
• The remit is broad, and it's yours. The gaps you close are visible and they matter.
• Real autonomy, real trust, and a path designed to grow into a Chief of Staff seat as the group scales into new markets.

Why work at Wave

• Shoreditch HQ with hybrid working (3 days in)
• 30+ days annual leave including birthday off and Christmas closure
• Private healthcare with AXA
• Enhanced parental leave
• Performance-related bonus
• Annual company trips for high achievers (past trips: Mexico, Vegas, Mykonos, Dubai)
• Apple equipment
• EMI share options tied to group growth