Manager – Category Operations (HCV – HSC)

Our Client: It's a leading logistics tech company in India that provides on-demand intra-city transportation services. The company's solutions cater to a variety of industries, offering features like real-time tracking, flexible pricing, and reliable delivery support across multiple cities.

Job Title: Manager Category Operations (HCV HSC)

Experience: 2 - 6 years

Education: MBA from Tier 1 college or Tier 2 (IIT, NIT, BITS) Engineering college

Locations: Chennai

About the Role: The Manager Category Operations will lead and scale day-to-day operations for the HSC business across multiple categories (Intercity - PTL & FTL, Intracity - 9ft, 10ft, 14ft, 17ft, etc) for Chennai city. The role demands strong execution capabilities, people leadership, and the ability to translate business vision into operational excellence. The ideal candidate is someone who has managed multi-category operations in a marketplace business, has managed high-performing teams, is comfortable with data, and, most importantly, understands ground realities well.

Key Responsibilities:

1. Operations Management:

• Drive day-to-day operations across business verticals with strong execution discipline.
• Plan supply for projected demand and ensure quality and operational standards.
• Allocate and manage city teams for on ground operational execution.

2. SOPs, GTMs & Process Excellence:

• Support in Implementing SOPs and GTM execution for new categories and process rollouts.
• Identify operational inefficiencies and drive improvements in partnership with Product, Analytics, and Central teams.
• Ensure adherence to standards around quality, turnaround times, and user experience.

3. Business & Category Leadership:

• Lead geographic and category expansion by collaborating with cross-functional stakeholders.
• Manage P&L for assigned categories along with other business co-owners.
• Build and execute strategic objectives.

4. Market Intelligence & Strategy:

• Track market trends around pricing, competition, and service quality to define short to medium( 1 day to 6 m) term strategies.
• Bring a strong eye for detail to understand micro-market nuances and routes, and tailor strategies accordingly for growth and customer experience.

5. Escalation & Risk Management:

• Enable teams to handle escalations with excellence and discipline, identify recurring patterns, and drive long-term structural fixes.
• Ensure effective governance mechanisms for city operations.

6. Vision & Roadmap:

• Create a clear operational vision and detailed roadmap for business excellence.
• Influence and lead multi-city teams through structured planning, communication, and performance management.

Skills & Competencies:

• Fluent in Tamil language.
• Deep on-ground bias with a roll-up-your-sleeves attitude and the willingness to go to the depth to uncover and address real issues.
• Ability to manage a team of Assistant Managers and team below, prior experience handling a team is must.
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to influence both leadership and ground teams.
• High comfort in using data and ground intelligence for decision-making.
• Ability to establish SOPs and processes to streamline operations.

Good-to-Have:

• Experience in logistics, mobility, supply chain, or marketplace operations.
• Exposure to category management roles involving both strategy and execution.
• Ability to work cross-functionally and manage multiple stakeholders.

Requirements:

• Typically, from a category management or large-scale operations background with accountability for operations.
• Strong communication, and team managerial skills.
• Hands-on, detail-oriented, and extremely process-driven.
• A leader who thrives in fast-paced, very uncertain, high-ownership environments.