Job Overview

The Lead, Service Delivery Management formerly known as the Director of School Operations (DSO) is a senior, enterprise-level leadership role responsible for operational excellence across a portfolio of Connections Academy schools. The Lead, Service Delivery Management focuses on strengthening the effectiveness of school leaders and leadership teams through hands-on partnership, coaching, and operational problem-solving. This role directly manages the primary school leader and at each school will work directly with principals, directors, and school leadership teams to ensure schools are operationally strong, well-supported, and positioned to serve students successfully.

The Lead uses a multi-layer leadership model to ensure alignment and execution of school operations to PVS standards and values. This is accomplished by supporting operational systems, compliance structures, and leadership accountability through school-based leadership teams. The scope of this role is inherently complex and high-impact, requiring a majority of time spent working directly with schools, the ability to lead leaders, operate at scale, and balance competing priorities across multiple schools and PVS simultaneously.

The Lead works in a number of cross-functional teams identified as key members to accomplish school goals. This includes close partnership with the School Success Partner (SSP), who holds overall accountability for school/account success and continuity of operations. In addition, they provide critical support to operationalize and hold leaders accountable for academic improvement strategies identified by the Academic Outcomes Teams.

Role Purpose

• Lead operational execution across multiple schools and leadership teams.
• Ensure compliance with regulations and contract requirements, operational efficiency, and sustainability at scale.
• Strengthen school leader effectiveness, stability, and succession
• Enable enrollment growth through operational readiness while maintaining a focus on student experience and success.
• Partner with SSP to translate account strategy into disciplined, scalable execution
• Support academic improvement by holding school leaders accountable to initiatives established by the Academic Outcomes team who holds academic accountability.
• Ensure Connections Academy model is implemented with fidelity and overall alignment to Pearson values.

Core Responsibilities

1. Portfolio-Level School Operations Leadership

• Directly manage and coach multiple school leaders across a portfolio of schools.
• Indirectly support and influence entire leadership teams and school staff through strong systems, expectations, and execution discipline.
• Establish consistent operational expectations across schools while allowing for local nuances where required.
• Hold school leaders accountable for execution of:
• Academic action plans and initiatives
• Compliance and charter/SOA requirements
• School year cycle milestones and operational deliverables
• Monitor operational health, engagement trends, and compliance indicators across schools to identify risks and required interventions.
• Provide structured, data-informed coaching to leaders to improve execution at scale.

1. Operational Sustainability & Enrollment Enablement

• Work closely with schools to ensure they are operationally prepared to support enrollment growth.
• Validate leadership capacity, staffing structures, onboarding processes, scheduling, and systems readiness at each school.
• Identify school operational constraints that could limit growth, persistence, or staff sustainability.
• Strengthen retention-supporting school practices that indirectly impact student and staff experience.
• Identify risks to charter stability and renewal readiness and work across PVS departments to mitigate risks.

1. School Year Cycle & Operational Readiness at Scale

• Ensure consistent execution of school year cycle activities across multiple schools, including:
• Calendar and handbook alignment
• Annual policy and process reviews
• Summer school planning
• Identify strain points affecting leaders and staff and coordinate mitigations across the portfolio of schools.

1. Leadership Management & Capacity Building

• Serve as a leader of leaders, managing school principals responsible for large, complex organizations.
• Establish clear performance expectations tied to operational excellence, compliance, and execution of strategic (academic, financial, etc.) initiatives.
• Conduct performance evaluations and manage development plans for school leaders.
• Lead hiring and onboarding of school leaders.
• Drive succession planning to ensure leadership stability across schools.
• Facilitate leadership development that cascades through leadership teams and school staff.

1. Board, Authorizer & External Partner Support

• Establish and maintain working relationships with boards, authorizers, districts, and other key partners as a key account team member, supporting the school leader and SSP by reinforcing trust, continuity, and effective communication-without assuming primary ownership of those stakeholder relationships.
• Support school leaders in effectively engaging with boards, authorizers, districts, and other key partners.
• Partner with school leaders to prepare for board, authorizer, and key partner meetings by supporting agenda development, data review, school performance narratives, and follow-up actions.
• As the School Leader's manager, support and contribute to the delivery of formal performance reviews of the school leader to the board, ensuring reviews are evidence-based, clearly articulated, and aligned to agreed-upon goals and governance expectations.

1. Change Management & Continuous Improvement

• Support operational change across multiple schools and leadership teams as PVS launches new products and services.
• Ensure adoption of enterprise systems, processes, and initiatives while working to minimize disruption to all stakeholders.
• Contribute to continuous refinement of the School Operations operating model.

Key Competencies

• Ability to lead leaders across multiple organizations
• Enterprise-scale operational judgment
• Cross-functional influence and alignment
• Capacity planning and sustainability thinking
• Accountability-driven coaching
• Risk identification and mitigation
• Executive communication and partnership

Success Indicators

• Multiple schools operate compliantly and sustainably year over year
• School leaders demonstrate strong execution discipline and stability
• Leadership teams and staff experience improved clarity, consistency, and predictability
• Enrollment growth is supported by strong operational readiness
• Operational risks are identified and mitigated before impacting continuity
• SSP and DSO partnership results in aligned, scalable account success

Requirements

• 3-5 years proven leadership experience as a Principal or equivalent level required
• Advanced degree in Education or Management is required
• Virtual school leadership required
• Flexible
• Innovative
• Comfortable with technology
• Strong communications skills
• Data-driven and results-focused
• Ability to travel frequently

Compensation at Pearson is influenced by factors including skill set, experience, and location.

The full-time salary range for this role is $140,000 - $150,000.

This position is eligible for Pearson's annual incentive program. Information on benefits can be found here.

Applications will be accepted through 7/24/26. This window may be extended depending on business needs.

Job: School Service Delivery

Job Family: LEARNING_&_CONTENT_DELIVERY

Organization: Virtual Learning

Schedule: FULL_TIME

Workplace Type: Remote

Req ID: 24780

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