Head of Service Assurance

SUMMARY:
Most service leaders are measured on how fast tickets close. This role asks a better question: did the customer actually get what they are paying for?

Our client is a fast growing South African energy as a service business with a national footprint. Its customers subscribe to reliable power rather than buying hardware, and they are free to leave at any time, so keeping them well looked after is the whole business model. As Head of Service Assurance you will report to the COO, take a seat on the management committee and own the customer’s experience from first contact to final fix. You will have the mandate, the data and a live monitoring estate to push for change wherever in the business the real cause sits.

POSITION INFO:
Duties and Responsibilities: Lead the service division through its contact centre and monitoring managers, and hold service accountability over second line technical support Set the standard for every customer conversation across the business, including sales and collections, and work with those leaders to make it stick Build and publish the customer experience baseline (CSAT, NPS, first contact resolution, complaint volumes and online sentiment), then move it in the right direction Own the escalation framework and major incident response, keeping customers informed and reassured while complex faults are resolved Use live system telemetry to spot problems before customers feel them, shifting the team from reactive to proactive Drive root cause analysis through to genuine closure, with a visible register of recurring issues and the department accountable for each Design and embed a practical quality assurance framework, knowledge base and playbooks that make great service consistent Shape the CX platform, telephony and reporting stack, replacing manual reporting with automated, executive ready dashboards Introduce AI into service workflows where it improves speed and quality, with sensible controls in place Manage the divisional budget, vendors, workforce planning and after hours cover across voice, email, messaging and social channels Own operational compliance for customer data, call recordings and complaint handling (POPIA, RICA and the CPA) within your division Run a dedicated service model for strategic and commercial accounts, including tailored SLAs and separate performance reporting Desired Experience and Qualifications At least 10 years in service operations, technical support operations or customer operations At least 5 years leading multiple teams through their own managers Hard evidence of customer experience measures you personally owned: the baseline, the improvement you delivered, the time frame and how it was measured Multichannel contact centre or service desk leadership across voice, email, messaging and social Direct experience handling executive level and reputationally sensitive customer escalations A record of improving how customers are communicated with during long or complex faults, not only how quickly faults are closed A three year degree or diploma in Engineering, Operations, Business, Information Systems, Service Management or a related field Preferred Experience running a technical field service or engineering interface alongside a contact centre, a background in renewable energy, utilities, telecommunications or similar infrastructure, and divisional budget ownership Comfortable reading telemetry data and challenging an engineering explanation on its merits Advantageous: an MBA or MBL; ITIL, ISO 9001 lead auditor, PMP or Prince2; experience in a high growth or private equity backed business; an additional South African language Comfortable using AI and digital tools to improve service quality and efficiency Package and Remuneration R 1 350 000 - R 1 450 000 per annum Interested? If you are interested in this opportunity, please apply via Pnet. If you wish to send your resume via email forward your CV to , insert the job title and copy the reference number in brackets in the subject line of your e-mail. If you have not had any response in two weeks, please consider the vacancy application unsuccessful. Your profile will be kept on our database for any other suitable position.