District Operations Director - Western NY

The District Director is responsible for directing, planning, and managing multiple travel plazas within a geographic area; accountable for achieving the district financial goals. This leader will have accountability for the sales, profits, and related metrics for their region and reports to the Road Director.

As a member of the Roadway leadership team, the District Director develops operating plans and related operational processes for their district and monitors the flow of work in alignment with broader business objectives, selects and develops effective managers and work teams, and manages their district through reliable systems and processes.

Key Responsibilities:

• Provide operational leadership to drive customer satisfaction, associate satisfaction, and financial performance for all Applegreen brands.
• Work with Plaza Directors to develop, revise and complete annual budgets, set financial targets, monitor expenses, and optimize resource allocation.
• Conduct weekly district meetings to review P&L performance, brand standards, staffing and people metrics within the district.
• Hire, retain and continually develop diverse, high-caliber talent that makes a strong positive impact on the organization. Anticipate future talent needs based on business plans. Develop plans to address skill and resource gaps. Address performance issues and align performance and rewards.
• Set priorities and drive results through effective people management and processes, utilizing reliable tools and leveraging resources to include other parts of the organization.
• Lead and facilitate the delivery of sustainable business results against growth and profitability objectives. Drive revenue growth through promotions, upselling and customer engagement strategies.
• Identify best practices across plazas and roll out knowledge transfer across stores / plazas, focusing on improving underperforming plazas. Develop processes to enhance communication and sharing of such best practices.
• Promote organizational alignment by ensuring that Applegreen’s overall business direction and strategies are understood by all associates.
• Understand food & beverage/retail brand standards, along with applicable regulations, and their potential impact on the business.
• Identify service improvements, anticipate challenges, and create competitive breakthrough strategies.
• Serve as change agent and provide oversight in the implementation of related programs and key initiatives.
• Hold high performance expectations, willingly own results, and hold others accountable regardless of reporting relationship.
• Put in place early warning systems and appropriate metrics to identify and manage business and financial risks.
• Work with corporate groups as appropriate to ensure smooth development/pre-opening/conversion process for plazas if applicable.

Required Skills/Abilities:

• Proven excellent leadership capability, including team development, performance management and conflict management.
• Strong financial acumen in the areas of budgeting and forecasting, P&L management, cost control and revenue growth.
• Operational excellence abilities including standardization, process improvement and crisis management.
• Strong communication skills with the ability to influence all levels of the organization.
• Excellent analytical, decision making, problem-solving and root cause identification skills.
• Customer focus driven, with the ability to leverage customer insights to improve operations.
• Systems proficiency and data analysis including the interpretation of KPI’s and dashboards to inform decisions.
• Familiarity with food handling, safety, and other restaurant/QSR guidelines.
• Excellent project management skills and ability to independently manage multiple projects.
• Proficient with Microsoft Office Suite or related software.

Education and Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree in business administration, management, hospitality, finance or related field.
• 5 – 7 years of multi-unit management experience.
• Progressive experience in F&B, retail or related operations.
• ServSafe certification a plus.

This job description is not an exhaustive list of all functions that the employee may be required to perform, and the employee may be required to perform additional functions. Additionally, the job responsibilities may change at any time as necessitated by business needs.