St Paul's Cathedral - Head of Visitor Operations

Overview

The Head of Visitor Operations has the crucial role of being the champion of the visitor at St Paul’s Cathedral, and has overall responsibility for the visitor experience during the Cathedral’s opening hours.  

Introduction

The Head of Visitor Operations has the crucial role of being the champion of the visitor at St Paul’s Cathedral, and has overall responsibility for the visitor experience during the Cathedral’s opening hours.  

Reporting into the Director of Visitor Engagement; this role has direct line management of four Visitor Experience Managers and wider responsibility for the Visitor Experience Assistants and the visitor engagement-led activities on the Cathedral floor over 365 days of the year.  

The Head of Visitor Operations is expected to work closely with colleagues across the Cathedral; recognising the strong cooperation needed to ensure St Paul’s continues to fulfil its multiple roles, and specifically its role as a place of worship, a centre of learning and a visitor attraction. 

This is a multifaceted role, designed to make sure each visitor has a positive experience, and supports the wider department to deliver its goals, defined in the Mission Directed Business Plan. The Head of Visitor Operations is responsible for motivating the Visitor Experience team to maximise our welcome, and provide excellent customer service. 

As a Head of Department, this role contributes to the wider leadership and management of the Cathedral, in addition to developing and embedding strategies, plans and culture through their team to ensure the Cathedral objectives are met

The closing date for applications is 9.00am on Wednesday 2nd March 2022.   

First interviews take place on Fri 11th March, second interviews on Weds 16th March 2022. 

Main Responsibilities

Staff Management and Leadership: 

• Leadership and line management of the Visitor Experience Managers, with ultimate responsibility for the wider Visitor Experience Assistant team. 

• Support the Visitor Experience Managers develop, helping them scope and achieve their operational projects and planning, driving performance and standards that adhere to Cathedral policies and procedures. 

• Ensure recruitment, training and management processes attract, develop and inspire a high performing, diverse team of staff who excel in customer service.  

• In collaboration with HR, develop performance management programmes to ensure the whole team continually improves and develops. 

• Collaborate with Cathedral colleagues to ensure consistent, regular sharing and communication of all visitor-related information to visitor-facing teams and to the wider organisation in support of continually improving service standards. 

Visitor Led: 

• Consistently review and seek improvements to the visitor operation to ensure the team deliver high levels of visitor satisfaction. 

• Lead on the implementation of formal Customer Service Standards, and set KPIs to monitor and feedback on performance. 

• Management of the multimedia guide contract, ensuring we have the right interpretation and best financial package, whilst supporting the Visitor Experience Managers to proactively manage the day-to-day relationship with the multi-media guides staff, ensuring visitor experience standards are met. 

• Act as departmental champion for Access & Diversity and support the delivery of the annual Access Day, to include being part of the Access Advisory Group. 

Events and Engagement: 

• Work with colleagues across the Cathedral to propose and develop new and innovative approaches to visitor engagement activities which drive footfall and income. 

• Alongside Sales & Ticketing and Marketing colleagues, actively analyse visitor feedback, market research, data and any other relevant information from day to day and special events.  

• Be a proactive part of Project Boards, planning and scheduling meetings for all events at the Cathedral. 

Operational Management: 

• Ensure the visitor engagement department takes an active role in the operational management of the Cathedral floor. This will require an on-site presence on some weekends and bank holidays across the year. 

• Work proactively with colleagues across the Cathedral to agree all operational requirements and ensure that all logistical and staffing plans are agreed and in place in advance, particularly during large scale VIP events. 

• Working alongside the Sales & Ticketing Manager, act as departmental owner of the ticketing system, ensuring ticketing operations are delivered effectively and efficiently to customers, internal stakeholders and other organisations with whom St Paul’s Cathedral works. 

• Ensure compliance with Health and Safety (H&S) requirements, including carrying out risk assessments as requested by the H&S Manager and others. Be an active member of the H&S Committee. 

• Work with the Head of Security, H&S Manager and others to ensure a safe and secure environment for staff and visitors, including actively participating in the development and fulfilment of major incident planning and actions. 

• Act as Duty Manager on a rota basis to ensure an overarching understanding of Cathedral floor operations. 

Volunteers:  

• In collaboration with the Volunteer Manager and Canon Steward, develop and deliver the Cathedral floor volunteer guide strategy. 

• Act as ‘Staff Lead’ to oversee relevant areas of the Cathedral Floor Volunteer Guide team both to maintain their enthusiasm and passion for their work. 

Financial:  

• Contribute to ensuring the effective resourcing of the Visitor Experience department by working with the Director of Visitor Engagement and Financial Controller to prepare appropriate budget proposals, closely monitoring spend and reporting on performance measures. 

• Manage staffing budgets and authorising necessary overtime – monitoring to ensure budgets are not exceeded and reporting on drivers of overtime. 

• Work with the Head of Commercial to maximise the revenue potential from all sources, including introducing targets on income sources such as donations, guidebook and annual pass sales, in a manner that is consistent with the role of the Cathedral as a centre for worship and mission. 

• Overall accountability for tills and security of cash and vouchers - reconciling takings and completing safe contents audits. Responsible for checking till records for accuracy and investigating discrepancies. 

   

The Ideal Candidate

The individual will have a broad range of skills with a key strength in creating and motivating effective teams and delivering exceptional customer service and driving an increase in footfall. Experience of delivering culture change will be vital as will the ability to understand the diverse needs of our visitors.  These skills include: 

Essential experience, knowledge and skills: 

• A passion for visitor engagement and excellent customer experience 

• Experience within a senior leadership or management role in a complex heritage, public engagement or visitor attraction  

• Able to quickly build credible partnerships internally and externally 

• Evidence of success in inspiring and motivating a large, diverse team 

• Experience of influencing and negotiating at varying organisational levels 

• Experience in delivering culture change and / or improvement strategies  

• Demonstrable personal resilience and supports other to develop the same 

• Ability to understand the processes of decision-making within a complex organisation 

• Commercially and financially astute with budget management experience 

• An understanding of the unique nature of St Paul’s as a place of worship, education, visitor attraction and a place of national focus 

Desirable experience, knowledge and skills: 

• Marketing, retail and/or contract management experience  

• Project and / or programme management skills  

• Experience of working successfully with volunteers 

About us

St Paul’s is an equal opportunities employer and holds together a very diverse set of activities and aspirations.  It is the Cathedral of the Diocese of London and the seat of its Bishop, a national church and an international spiritual focus, a space for worship and holiness, a place of learning, debate and challenge, an icon of resilience in the face of adversity, an architectural heritage centre, a partner in the City of London, and a commercial enterprise. In addition to offering acts of worship throughout the day, St Paul’s is open for prayer and sight-seeing seven days a week.