Director of Third-Party Operations (Collections & Recoveries)

Key Responsibilities

• Own third-party strategy across North America: design the vendor portfolio (on/off/near-shore), run RFPs, negotiate MSAs/SOWs, set SLAs/KPIs, and implement rigorous vendor governance and scorecards.
• P&L, forecasting and ROI: manage budgets and margin, optimize placement strategy, capacity, and cost-to-collect across internal teams and external partners.
• Performance leadership: drive collections/recoveries and post-charge-off results; implement test-and-learn frameworks (champion/challenger) across dialer, digital, and legal strategies.
• Reporting modernization: build a future-state reporting stack and data governance (single source of truth, automated QC, SLA dashboards, client-ready insights, metadata/data dictionary).
• AI and automation: deploy conversational AI/voicebots/chatbots, speech analytics, QA automation, propensity/risk models, workflow/RPA, and next-best-action; partner with Data/IT on integration, APIs, and model governance.
• Workforce and resource planning: set capacity plans and schedules across vendors and internal teams; ensure tools, facilities, and inventory support efficient operations.
• Client leadership: serve as the executive point of contact for delivery, quarterly business reviews, and continuous improvement roadmaps.
• Department building: hire, coach, and develop leaders; define operating rhythms, playbooks, and OKRs to scale a high-performing function.

Required Experience & Skills

• 5+ years in collections/recoveries operations with 3rd-party/BPO vendor management; 5+ years leading pre- and post-charge-off portfolios.
• 3+ years in senior leadership owning P&L, SLAs, and multi-site or multi-vendor delivery.
• Proven record building or transforming a third-party program (selection, onboarding, governance, performance uplift).
• Deep domain knowledge: collections strategies, recoveries, skip tracing, charge-off/legal workflows, and regulatory/compliance frameworks.
• Tech-savvy and AI-forward: hands-on experience deploying automation, speech analytics, conversational AI, RPA/workflow tools, and A/B testing in production.
• Reporting and analytics: expert in KPI design and client reporting; proficiency with BI tools (e.g., Power BI/Tableau/Looker), data visualization, and partnering on data pipelines; basic SQL a plus.
• Tools familiarity (examples): collections platforms (e.g., FICO Debt Manager, Katabat), dialer/CX (e.g., Genesys, NICE CXone, Five9/TCN), speech analytics/QA (e.g., CallMiner, Verint), workflow/RPA (e.g., UiPath).
• Strong financial acumen: forecasting, budgeting, unit economics, and vendor ROI optimization.
• Exceptional leadership: hiring, coaching, performance management; clear communicator with clients and executives.
• Nice to have: Certifications: Lean Six Sigma, PMP, or relevant data/AI certifications. Experience with data privacy, model risk governance, and secure integrations in regulated environments.