Customer Operations - Lead

About Ethos

Ethos is a leading life insurance technology company on a mission to protect families by democratizing access to life insurance and empowering agents at scale. With its robust three-sided technology platform, Ethos is transforming the life insurance experience for consumers, agents, and carriers alike. Ethos offers instant, accessible products and a seamless online process that requires no medical exams and just a few health questions; it eliminates traditional barriers, making it easier than ever for everyone to protect their families. Ethos is redefining how life insurance is bought, sold, and underwritten.

About the Role:

As the Customer Operations Lead at Ethos, you will lead a team of up to 10 -12 Associates, ensuring they deliver an exceptional experience to new and existing customers and the insurance agents who refer business to Ethos. You will combine hands-on customer support leadership with team management, coaching, and process improvement to drive team performance and customer satisfaction.This role requires strong people-leadership skills alongside the deep product, systems, and communication expertise expected of frontline associates.Creating a positive customer and agent experience is critical to Ethos's success in the life insurance industry, and this role is central to scaling that experience through a high-performing team.

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Team Leadership & People Management

  • Directly manage, coach, and develop a team of up to 10 Customer Operations Associates
  • Conduct regular 1:1s, performance reviews, and career development conversations
  • Set individual and team goals aligned with broader Customer Operations objectives, and track progress against defined service levels (SLAs)
  • Manage team scheduling, staffing coverage, and workload distribution across email, live chat, SMS, and phone channels
  • Recruit, onboard, and train new team members; build and maintain onboarding/training materials
  • Foster a positive, accountable, and high-performance team culture

• Operational Excellence

  • Ensure the team maintains accuracy in all communications with customers/agents on policy /agent comp related queries
  • Own team-level quality assurance — audit interactions, provide feedback, and drive continuous improvement in service quality
  • Monitor team metrics (response times, resolution rates, CSAT/agent satisfaction, SLA adherence) and report performance to management

• Process & Cross-Functional Collaboration

  • Identify opportunities for process improvements across the team's functions and lead implementation of agreed-upon solutions
  • Partner with other cross-functional teams to resolve systemic issues and represent the voice of the customer/agent
  • Develop and maintain team knowledge base, playbooks, and SOPs to ensure consistency and scalability
  • Support hiring, capacity planning, and resource forecasting as the team grows

• Subject Matter Expertise

  • Maintain and deepen expert-level understanding of Ethos products, consumer policy systems, and partner agent systems
  • Serve as the team's go-to resource for complex queries/scenarios

Qualifications and Skills:

• 3-5+ years of experience in customer support, customer success, or operations, including at least 1-2 years in a team lead, supervisor, or people management role
• Proven experience managing and developing a team of 5+ direct reports
• Experience in life insurance or a related industry strongly preferred
• Bachelor's degree preferred
• Proficiency with Salesforce or equivalent support/help desk software; experience with reporting/dashboarding tools a plus
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to interpret team performance data and translate it into action
• Excellent coaching, feedback delivery, and conflict-resolution skills
• Adaptable and resilient, able to lead a team through change while maintaining quality and morale
• Excellent phone presence, written communication, and cross-functional collaboration skills