Senior Manager - Operations & Business Development

Sales / Marketing / Business Development / Merchandising

About the Employer

Job Description

Senior Manager – Operations & Business Development

Company: Lift (Ride-hailing)

Location: Colombo, Sri Lanka (with travel across major cities)

Reports to: CEO/Founder

Type: Full-time

About Lift

Lift is building Sri Lanka's next-generation ride-hailing platform—reliable, safe, and fairly priced for riders and drivers. We’re competing head-to-head with category leaders by focusing on hyper-local ops excellence, driver earnings, and delightful customer experience.

Role Snapshot

We’re hiring a Senior Manager – Operations & Business Development to launch, grow, and optimize Lift across Sri Lanka. You’ll own marketplace health (supply vs. demand), city launches, partner ecosystems, and revenue growth—while building the on-ground team and processes that scale.

What You’ll Do

  • Own City Ops: Plan and execute city launches; design supply/demand tactics, zoning, and driver incentives.
  • Marketplace Management: Monitor live KPIs (ETAs, acceptance, cancellations, churn), diagnose root causes, and drive real-time interventions.
  • Driver Growth & Quality: Lead driver acquisition funnels (digital + on-ground), training, safety compliance, and earnings optimization.
  • Business Development: Secure B2B/B2G partnerships (corporate ride programs, airport/hotel stands, tourism boards, events) and fleet partnerships.
  • Customer Experience & Safety: Set up SOPs for support, incident response, fraud prevention, and safety audits with measurable SLAs.
  • Regulatory & Compliance: Build strong relationships with municipal and transport authorities; ensure licensing and policy compliance.
  • Team Leadership: Hire, coach, and manage city leads, field teams, and partner managers; instill KPI-driven culture.
  • Data-Driven Ops: Build dashboards with Ops/BI; run experiments on pricing, incentives, and promos; translate insights into action.
  • Cross-Functional: Work with Product/Engineering/Marketing on feature requests, geo-ops (maps, POIs), promo calendars, and comms.

What You’ll Bring

  • 7–12 years in high-velocity ops and growth roles in ride-hailing, logistics, food delivery, e-commerce, or mobility tech.
  • Proven P&L ownership and city/market launch experience.
  • Strong BD/enterprise sales track record with C-level stakeholders and public sector.
  • Fluent in English and Sinhala (Tamil an advantage); excellent negotiation & stakeholder management.
  • Analytical proficiency (Excel/Sheets; bonus for SQL/Looker/Data Studio).
  • Deep understanding of Sri Lankan mobility landscape, driver motivations, and local regulations.
  • Willingness to travel and work field hours when needed; valid driver’s license.

Nice to Have

  • Experience at Uber/PickMe/Delivery/Logistics startups or telco/payment partners.
  • Maps/dispatch familiarity (service areas, heatmaps, demand forecasting).
  • Safety, risk, or trust & safety program experience.

Why Join Lift

  • Build a category challenger with real local impact.
  • High ownership, fast decisions, and a mission-first culture.
  • Competitive compensation + performance bonus + ESOP potential.
  • Tools, budget, and autonomy to scale your playbook nationwide.

Compensation & Benefits

  • Competitive base salary (LKR, aligned to experience).
  • Fuel/phone allowances, medical insurance.
  • Travel & training budget.

How to Apply

Send your CV, a brief note on one city you launched or scaled, and two partnerships you closed to hrliftholdings@gmail.com with subject line Senior Manager – Ops & BD – [Your Name].