Director Call Center Operations - Recipient Customer Service

Change people's lives and love what you do! Cochlear is the most recognized brand in hearing health care. Director Call Center Operations - Recipient Customer Service Position Spotlight: - 10+ years of progressive leadership in high-touch call center environments, with direct oversight of frontline teams, supervisors, and operational support staff. - Working knowledge of commercial and government insurance services related to the medical device industry - Demonstrated success in scaling and optimizing call center performance through workforce planning, KPI management, and continuous improvement initiatives. - Proven ability to implement customer-centric strategies and process improvement methodologies (e.g. Lean Six Sigma, etc.) to enhance service delivery, reduce call handling time, and boost customer satisfaction. About the role Change people's lives and love what you do at Cochlear-the most recognized brand in hearing health care-helping people hear and be heard around the world, while being part of one of Denver Business Journal's 2026 Best Places to Work honorees in Denver We are hiring a Director, Recipient Customer Service, a role requiring a strong commitment to operational excellence and customer satisfaction. In this role, you will be based in our Americas head office in Lone Tree, CO. In this role, you will lead a high-performing, 100+ person contact center responsible for delivering a seamless, end-to-end customer experience across order management, technical support, and revenue enablement. You will own service performance outcomes-including service levels, quality, customer satisfaction, and operational efficiency-while partnering cross-functionally with Commercial, Reimbursement, Supply Chain, IT, and Quality to continuously improve how we serve our customers. As a key leader within the business, you will balance strategic leadership with hands-on execution. You will define and drive a multi-year roadmap to modernize the service model-leveraging automation, AI, and process simplification-to scale operations and improve both customer and employee experiences. Success in this role requires a leader who can move quickly, remove barriers, and lead from the front-diving into operational challenges while maintaining a clear view of long-term transformation goals. Equally important, you will build and lead a high-performance culture grounded in accountability, transparency, and empathy. You'll coach and develop leaders, raise the talent bar, and foster an environment where teams feel supported, challenged, and empowered to deliver results. This is a highly visible role that demands strong executive presence, resilience, and a deep commitment to delivering meaningful outcomes for both customers and the business. Key Responsibilities Operational Leadership & Results Delivery - Own performance outcomes across a 100+ FTE contact center, including service levels, quality, productivity, and customer satisfaction. - Drive consistent achievement of KPIs through rigorous performance management, data-driven decision-making, and continuous improvement. - Demonstrate a strong ownership mindset and extreme accountability for results, taking full responsibility for both successes and gaps. - Exhibit a willingness to do the hard, unglamorous work required to drive results, including deep dives into workflows, escalations, and frontline barriers. - Lead from the front by engaging directly with operations, reinforcing that no task is beneath leadership. - Remove obstacles quickly and decisively to ensure operational continuity and goal attainment. Strategic Leadership & Business Partnership - Serve as a trusted advisor to regional and global leadership on customer service strategy, performance, and transformation. - Present regularly to senior executives on call center performance, service levels, customer insights, and operational isks/opportunities. - Define and execute a multi-year roadmap to scale the service center, incorporating automation, AI, digital channel expansion, and process redesign. - Partner cross-functionally (Commercial, Reimbursement, Supply Chain, IT, Quality) to improve end-to-end customer experience and order fulfillment outcomes. Customer Service Operations & Contact Center Excellence - Lead a multi-channel contact center ensuring delivery of service levels, responsiveness, and high-quality interactions. - Own performance across key metrics including ASA, SLAs, abandonment rate, first contact resolution, quality scores, and customer satisfaction. - Partner with Workforce Management to optimize staffing models, scheduling, forecasting, and real-time performance management. - Lead telephony and routing strategy, ensuring effective call segmentation, escalation pathways, and performance optimization. - Build operational discipline through data visibility, reporting, and real-time management practices. Order Management & Revenue Enablement - Lead intake through end-to-end customer service for order management, including insurance and self-pay transactions. - Drive upgrade order growth, conversion, and revenue realization through process optimization and service excellence. - Ensure accuracy, compliance, and efficiency across order entry, verification, and fulfillment processes. - Identify and remove friction points impacting order cycle time and customer effort. Operational Excellence, Process & Technology Transformation - Lead transformation from manual, fragmented processes to standardized, scalable workflows. - Evaluate and implement automation, AI, and self-service capabilities to improve efficiency and reduce cost-to-serve. - Drive continuous improvement initiatives leveraging Lean or similar methodologies. - Partner with IT and Digital teams to enhance Salesforce, knowledge management, and workflow tools. - Establish scalable infrastructure for data-driven decision-making and performance management. People Leadership & Culture - Lead, coach, and develop people leaders and frontline teams, ensuring strong leadership capability at all levels. - Create a high-performance, high-accountability culture where expectations are clear and results are consistently delivered. - Reinforce a culture of ownership, accountability, and disciplined execution at every level of the organization. - Coach leaders to take end-to-end ownership of performance and customer outcomes, avoiding escalation dependency. - Raise the talent bar through hiring, development, succession planning, and performance management. - Foster an environment grounded in trust, integrity, inclusion, and customer-centricity while maintaining high standards. Performance Management & Analytics - Establish and continuously refine KPIs, dashboards, and reporting frameworks aligned to business outcomes. - Use data to proactively identify trends, risks, and improvement opportunities. - Drive root cause analysis and corrective actions to improve service, quality, and efficiency. - Ensure consistency in quality monitoring, coaching, and calibration processes. Customer Experience & Continuous Improvement - Lead initiatives to reduce customer effort and improve ease of doing business. - Incorporate customer feedback into process, policy, and service design improvements. - Champion a customer-first mindset across all interactions and decisions. Key Requirements To add value to Cochlear in this role you'll be able to meet and demonstrate the following knowledge, skills and abilities in your application and at interview: - Bachelor's degree required; Master's degree preferred - 10+ years of progressive leadership experience in customer service, call center, or operations environments, with direct team leadership - Proven experience leading large-scale co