Business Ops (BizOps)

A Business Ops (BizOps), or Business Operations, professional helps leadership solve strategic problems through analysis. They clarify the question to address, compare solutions and support implementation with the managers involved. Their value lies in connecting a decision with the changes needed to put it into practice.

The issues assigned to BizOps span several departments. They require bringing information together, testing assumptions against one another and understanding teams’ constraints. The role therefore involves more than producing dashboards or managing sales operations. Analysis must lead to an actionable recommendation, followed by monitoring of the agreed actions.

BizOps professionals work with senior leaders and the managers responsible for the activities concerned. Their reporting line and autonomy depend on the organisation. Before recruiting, clarify which decisions they can make, which they prepare and which require a decision from someone with the authority to resolve the issue. The ability to engage stakeholders matters particularly when the role has no line management authority over them.

BizOps, overall operations leadership and sales operations: who does what?

• BizOps analyses strategic problems across departments and supports projects agreed with leadership.
• A COO meets the need for overall leadership of operations. The BizOps title does not confer this responsibility.
• Sales operations focuses on one business function. A BizOps assignment may involve that function without being limited to it.

To define the role, start with the problems to solve and the stakeholders to involve. The same title may cover supervised analysis or independent project leadership. Available role descriptions, mainly from international technology companies, shed light on these responsibilities without defining an organisational structure that applies everywhere.

The challenge when recruiting is to connect sound reasoning with a decision the company can implement. A detailed model adds little if the initial question remains unclear. Conversely, launching a project without examining its assumptions risks committing teams to a solution poorly suited to the problem.

Start by clarifying what leadership expects from the analysis. A comparison of scenarios should make the economic assumptions and the implications of each option clear. A dashboard should help its intended user make decisions. The number of presentations produced is therefore not enough to assess the role’s contribution: look at what the analysis helped clarify and what was actually implemented.

Fictional example: leadership is considering changing how a product is brought to market. It asks BizOps to compare the options and their economic implications. The managers involved provide their data and explain their constraints. The BizOps professional prepares a recommendation, then supports the chosen option. To assess their work, leadership examines the soundness of the assumptions, the teams’ understanding of the choices and the indicators agreed for tracking the change.

The risk of a poor hire depends on the actual need. Someone highly comfortable with analysis may lack experience in leading implementation. Conversely, a strong coordinator may need support to build an economic model. Assess these dimensions separately rather than inferring them from a previous job title.

Finally, give the role an explicit framework for decision-making. Without someone responsible for resolving disagreements, a BizOps professional may hold more and more discussions without moving the project forward. Without available contacts in each department, their recommendations risk overlooking the conditions needed for implementation. Recruitment and the organisation of the work must be prepared together.

• Frame the strategic problems assigned by leadership and formulate the questions to resolve.
• Make the assumptions underpinning the analysis explicit.
• Build economic models to compare possible solutions.
• Present a reasoned recommendation to the relevant decision-makers.
• Lead the implementation of selected projects with department heads.
• Define useful indicators for monitoring results.
• Build dashboards that inform leadership decisions.

Documented career backgrounds include strategy consulting, investment banking, finance and operational roles. They offer different experiences of analysis and business. What a candidate has learnt depends on the responsibilities they have actually held: neither their career path nor the name of their previous employer is enough to establish their skills or level of autonomy.

Structuring a question and presenting a recommendation are useful skills gained in consulting. However, experience of execution depends on involvement in implementation after the decision: handing work over to another team and supporting its application are different experiences.

The models built and an understanding of their assumptions are useful foundations gained in finance or investment banking. Proficiency in calculations alone says little about the ability to work with several departments. Operational experience can provide this understanding of work on the ground, but is not enough to establish the ability to move from a local problem to analysis that is useful to leadership.

Useful capabilities combine quantitative reasoning, economic understanding, communication and project delivery, without requiring a single educational path. The degree of autonomy depends on the assignment: conducting analysis with a manager available for support and independently leading a project across departments require different levels of autonomy.

The foundations of GetPro’s assessment method

GetPro structures assessment around a framework limited to ten criteria, with an assessment method for each. This framework distinguishes verifiable aspects of a candidate’s background from skills to explore further at interview.

Interviews explore three or four essential criteria through open questions and concrete examples. Reference checks examine skills that still need clarification, placing observations in the context of the working relationship. A summary brings together strengths and areas requiring attention to inform the decision.

Suggested applications to the BizOps role

The following steps suggest an adaptation for BizOps, to be adjusted to the responsibilities of the role. They do not constitute a specific protocol used by GetPro.

1. Define the criteria before the interviews

Choose the capabilities that matter most for the role: framing a problem, analysing data, comparing options, explaining a recommendation and supporting its implementation. Specify the degree of autonomy expected for each.

Link each criterion to something observable. For problem framing, look for a clearly formulated question and explicit assumptions. For execution, look for an explanation of responsibilities, how decisions were made to resolve competing demands and how results were monitored.

Agree the criteria with the senior leader and the managers involved. Distinguish skills needed from the outset from those that can be developed with clearly identified support.

2. Examine a past achievement

Ask the candidate to describe a project from the initial request through to implementation. Ask them to clarify their personal role, the information available and the decisions made by other people.

Invite them to explain an assumption they abandoned and what changed their reasoning. Ask how they assessed the project’s results. Accept an anonymised presentation when the original documents are confidential.

A precise account that distinguishes personal contribution from collective work is a positive sign. An answer focused on the presentations produced, with no identifiable decision or follow-up, calls for further questions.

3. Set a case exercise relevant to the role

Fictional example: leadership is weighing up two ways to bring a product to market. Some data is incomplete and the managers involved describe different constraints. Ask the candidate to prepare a provisional recommendation.

Provide the information needed for the reasoning and identify what has deliberately been left out. Ask what analyses the candidate would carry out, which assumptions they would use and what could change their conclusion.

Observe their ability to prioritise the questions. Ask them to explain their model and the limitations of the indicators used. For a role requiring independent work with data, add an exercise suited to the tools actually used in the company.

A clear recommendation with explicit limitations is a positive sign. Precise figures without verifiable assumptions, or a conclusion that does not respond to new information, should be a cause for concern.

4. Examine cooperation and the resolution of competing demands

Ask the candidate to present their recommendation to a department head who challenges it. Ask them to specify which constraints to examine, which points are negotiable and whom to approach for a decision.

Observe whether they listen to the objection before defending their analysis. Ask how they would involve managers in implementation. If they will manage a team, add questions about allocating work and supporting team members.

Look for an ability to move the discussion forward without confusing conviction with authority. An answer that assumes departments will automatically agree leaves an essential dimension of the role unproven.

5. Compare observations and references

With the candidate’s consent, ask people who have worked with them about the nature of their contribution, their autonomy and their follow-through during implementation. Ask questions linked to the criteria defined at the outset.

If the company lacks the necessary analytical expertise, involve an assessor with expertise in analysis or modelling. Ask the senior leader and the managers involved to assess business relevance and cooperation.

Finally, compare the observations gathered. Document the established findings and remaining uncertainties before deciding. Avoid allowing a favourable overall impression to compensate for a gap in a skill essential to the role.