About Us:

HomeAway, based in Austin, Texas, is the world leader in vacation rentals with more than 2 million unique places to stay in 190 countries, and is a part of the Expedia, Inc. family of brands.

HomeAway offers an extensive selection of vacation rental homes that provide travelers with memorable experiences and benefits, especially more room to relax, for less than the cost of traditional hotel accommodations. The company also makes it easy for vacation rental owners and property managers to advertise their properties and manage bookings online. 

The Opportunity:

HomeAway is looking for a proactive, analytical and technically skilled leader to join our Global Customer Experience Operations team in Austin, Texas. The mission of the team is to find and implement business process improvement initiatives. Our culture is one that strives to solve difficult problems through rigorous hypothesis-based testing, empowering people to come up with ideas and data-driven solutions quickly. Our team is passionate about learning the drivers of the business and leveraging data, technology and analytics to provide valuable data insights that drive the company's critical business decisions and improvement efforts. We are looking for a Senior Manager to support our global business analysts in their mission of continuous process improvement. In this role, you will work with all of our geographies and organizational departments. 

Key responsibilities of this team includes identifying and designing process improvements that represent meaningful change in agent productivity, costs or customer efforts. This role reports to the Sr. Director of Global Customer Experience Operations Program Management, and requires an individual with excellent analytical and technical abilities, combined with strong presentation and communication skills. 

Team Responsibilities: 

• Design and implement solutions that meet applicable business requirements, including improved productivity, reduction in costs, and reduction in customer effort.
• Identify areas for improvement, implement improvement strategies, conduct data and statistical analysis, collect departmental performance data, and work cooperatively with internal and cross functional departments.
• Implement Lean and/or Six Sigma methods to design and implement process efficiencies.
• Partner with departmental stakeholders to prioritize improvement projects based on highest potential value added, and proactively drive initiatives from there.
• Partner with the Product Integration team to funnel optimization needs to product line teams, in order to create a more effortless customer experience.
• Participate in and at times help lead sections of the Customer Experience leadership weekly meetings to ensure insight-based decision making.
• Directly manage team of 4-6 professionals, ensuring we have training and career development plans that will set them up for success today and into the future.

General Skills: 

• Passion for logical problem solving and intellectual challenges. 
• Strong business sense, strategic thinking and team player.
• Ability to change the hearts and minds of employees affected by process changes.
• Engage employees to inspire and empower them to provide input into process change and embracing that change.
• Must be comfortable with uncertainty by prioritizing effectively and flexibly handling changes.
• Able to work across different business units/countries to communicate findings company-wide.
• Ability to build and present evidence-based stories. 
• Excellent organization skills and ability to manage multiple projects concurrently. 

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree and 6+ years of experience in process improvement (e.g. consulting background) OR Master's degree and 3+ years of experience. 
• 4+ years experience managing teams. 
• 3+ years experience in either eCommerce/travel industry or strategic consulting strongly preferred. 
• Proven track record of solving complex business problems and communicating easily understood recommendations to teams for implementation. 
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with demonstrable ability to deliver compelling fact-based presentations. 
• Must be fluent in English.

Benefits:

• Competitive health and insurance benefits
• Competitive salary
• Annual target bonus or commission
• Paid vacation and sick time
• Vacation rental on a yearly basis (taxable benefit)
• Employee Stock Purchase Program
• Free snacks and beverages
• Frequent company update talks with our leadership team
• Free listing on HomeAway.com
• Electronic, adjustable stand-up desk
• Discounted Metro & Rail pass