Location
Glasgow
Salary
From £75,000 per annum
Contract
Permanent ( Full Time
)
Reference
4105
Closing Date
20 July 2026
Job description
As Senior Manager – Operational Excellence within Business Operations, you’ll play a pivotal role in shaping and delivering effective, safe and customer‑focused change across Business Banking. Reporting to the Head of Business Operations, this role sits at the heart of how strategic and tactical change is assessed, governed and embedded within an operation of circa 400 colleagues.
Leading a high‑performing Operational Excellence function, you’ll oversee the design and execution of robust change management and governance frameworks, ensuring that change is delivered smoothly, compliantly and with minimal disruption to customers and colleagues. You’ll work across complex, multi‑journey environments including Start & Set Up, Everyday Banking, and Borrow & Grow, partnering closely with senior leaders, transformation teams and business control functions.
This is a senior leadership role requiring strong judgement, influence and commercial acumen. You’ll balance pace with control, driving service improvement, mitigating risk and continuously enhancing customer and colleague experience as the business evolves.
We support small and medium businesses and larger enterprises to build livelihoods, create jobs and power local economies. We are ambitious, we want to grow and scale our business, and we are investing in our Business Banking teams to get ready for growth and ready to deliver more ‘simply brilliant experiences’.
This role sits within Business Operations , supporting Business Banking, and is central to how change is led, managed and embedded across the operation. The Senior Manager – Operational Excellence is accountable for ensuring that all planned change is effectively assessed, governed and implemented in line with regulatory expectations, risk appetite and customer outcomes. You will lead a team of Operational Excellence Operations Managers and their teams.
By providing clear leadership, structured frameworks and expert oversight, the role ensures that change enhances performance, strengthens controls and improves experiences for both customers and colleagues, while safeguarding business resilience.
At Nationwide we offer hybrid working wherever possible. More rewarding relationships are supported through our hybrid approach, bringing colleagues together across our UK wide estate, whilst also supporting generous access to home working. We value our time in the office to solve problems, to learn, and to feel connected.
For this job you'll spend at least two days per week, or if part time you'll spend 40% of your working time, based at our Glasgow office. If you’re based at our Glasgow office, this will apply from 1 April 2027 and ahead of that there will be a need to regularly connect with colleagues for collaboration events. If your application is successful, your hiring manager will provide further details on how this works. You can also find out more about our approach to hybrid working here .
Whilst these locations are where we are primarily looking to fill the role, if you’re an internal applicant based in a different location we would welcome your application and if successful, your hiring manager will provide further details on how this could work for this specific role. You can also find out more about our approach to hybrid working here .
Virgin Money is now part of Nationwide
Nationwide acquired Virgin Money in October 2024. Virgin Money continues to serve customers on the high street, and there will be a phased and considered integration over the coming years.
You’ll be employed by Nationwide from day one, delivering real impact and benefitting from a highly competitive range of benefits. We’re a workplace where you’re rewarded, recognised and celebrated.
If we receive a high volume of relevant applications, we may close the advert earlier than the advertised date, so please apply as soon as you can.
What you’ll be doing
You’ll lead a team Operational Excellence Operations Managers responsible for overseeing change across Business Operations, ensuring governance, impact assessment and delivery standards are applied consistently. On a day‑to‑day basis, you’ll partner with senior stakeholders to prioritise and plan change, balancing strategic objectives with operational readiness and customer impact. You’ll provide visible leadership across complex programmes, including integration activity, ensuring risks are identified, mitigated and clearly communicated. You’ll also champion the use of insight, data and modern tooling to improve how change is delivered and embedded across the operation.
About you
As a minimum you’ll have:
Proven senior leadership experience delivering and embedding change within a large, complex operational environment, ideally within financial services
Strong expertise in change leadership, governance and impact assessment across multiple concurrent initiatives
Demonstrable experience managing and developing multi‑disciplinary teams, including operational and change specialists
Highly effective stakeholder management skills, with experience influencing senior leaders up to Director level
Excellent understanding of risk, control and regulatory considerations within change delivery
Experience supporting large‑scale transformation or integration programmes
Ability to use data, insight and modern tooling to drive informed decision‑making and continuous improvement
Our customer first behaviours put customers and members at the heart of how we work together. They are the set of behaviours that every colleague needs to display, in every role:
Feel what customers feel - We step into our customers’ shoes, using their feedback and insights to empathise with them and to understand their needs, so that every decision we make starts and finishes with our customers in mind
Say it straight - We are brave in speaking out and saying what we think – we’re honest and direct with good intent, openly sharing diverse perspectives to reach the best conclusions and using language everyone can understand
Push for better - We don’t settle for mediocrity, we challenge the status quo, taking responsibility for continuous improvement and personal development
Get it done - We prioritise what will have the greatest impact, we are decisive, and we take accountability for delivering brilliant customer outcomes
You can strengthen your application by showing how our customer first behaviours resonate with you, and where you may have already demonstrated these.
The extras you’ll get
There are all sorts of employee benefits available at Nationwide, including:
30 days holiday, pro rata
Private medical insurance
A highly competitive pension to help you build a strong foundation for retirement
Access to an annual performance-related bonus
Training and development to help you progress your career
A great selection of additional benefits through our salary sacrifice scheme
Life assurance to provide peace of mind for you and your loved ones in the event of your death
Wellhub – access to a range of free and paid options for health and wellness
Up to 2 days of paid volunteering a year
Banking – but fairer, more rewarding, and for the good of society
We forge our own path at Nationwide.
As a mutual, we’re owned by our members - those customers who bank, save or have a mortgage with us. We challenge the financial sector status quo. We don’t see customers as the engine of our own profit. We share our profits with them and put their needs first. Always there when they need us. Supporting them and their lives.
If you’re inspired by fairer finances, passionate about making a meaningful impact, and truly care about our customers, you’re one of us.
At Nationwide, you are challenged to grow and rewarded for doing so. Valued. Recognised. Inspired to be your best. As a community, we want our working lives to count. As a team, we celebrate what we achieve. As a standard-setter, we work for the good of customers, communities, and broader society.
We are purpose-driven. Uncompromisingly customer. Unstoppably Nationwide.
What to do next
If this role is for you, please click the ‘Apply Now’ button. You’ll need to attach your up-to-date CV and answer a few quick questions for us.
We respond to everyone, so we will be in contact shortly after the closing date to let you know the outcome of your application.
Please note that should you be successful in securing this role, the job title on our internal systems will be Senior Manager Ops Excellence.
