Customer Experience Manager

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Key Information:

Job title: Customer Experience Manager

Salary: Up to £59,500, depending on experience                                       

Band: 3

Contract type: TfL, Permanent                     

Location: Palestra, Blackfriars Road, SE1

Application closing date: 22/04/2025

 
Hybrid working within this role enables a balance of 50 per cent of time split between the office and home over a 4-week period. Hybrid working arrangements can evolve subject to business requirements.  
 
Transport for London is one of the UK’s best loved brands, with its iconic roundel seen all over London – and this is an exciting time to join us. The industry is changing with COVID having accelerated transformation within the organisation and the way people travel. We know we need to change to stay relevant and to be the strong green heartbeat London needs as it recovers from the pandemic. This exciting role is about ensuring we understand how we can win customers back by knowing what makes them feel valued and developing polices and programmes to drive improvements.

Overview of project/role 
 
Can you help shape the future of travel in London, moving it forward safely, inclusively and sustainably and help to deliver our customer roadmap? We put customers at the heart of all our decisions and are constantly looking for ways to innovate and improve their experience. We keep London moving, and you can be an integral part of this as we shape our future. In this role you will be helping plan and drive improvements to London Underground but  you could be working across different modes, and sharing best practice with Bus colleagues  or  working on a shared programme with DLR colleagues. 

In this role you will:

•    Learn and champion an in-depth understanding of the operational businesses’ requirements across all our modes and bring this together with expertise from the Customer Insight, Strategy & Experience team and colleagues from across Customer.
•    Identify existing and emerging customer and business needs and translate these strategic priorities into achievable operational actions whilst championing the improvements that are most important to our customers. 
•    Influence and own complex initiatives, facilitating collaboration and leveraging resources from across the organisation to achieve high-quality customer outcomes and delivery of our Customer Strategy.
•    Collaborate with stakeholders across the organisation driving them to put customer at the heart of their plans and decision making

 
 
Key Accountabilities  
 
1.    Be a trusted advisor to our operational teams on all-things ‘customer’ – bringing knowledge / insight / strategic awareness of what our customers want, flagging impacts on customers before decisions are taken and recommending activities to support the Customer Strategy.

2.    Compile a complete understanding of the requirements of customers, by working with the Insight and Strategy team, keeping abreast and understanding the implications of relevant best practice and customer service policy to improve the experience for new and existing customers.   

3.    Work with operational teams to compile a forward look of strategic customer opportunities, ensuring we, as the customer rep, are involved upstream in shaping requirements. 

4.    Own and drive key customer projects, working alongside the operational teams, through programme management / delivering actions / managing stakeholders’ expectations / project evaluation and review. This could include initiatives such as reducing customer related safety incidents, helping to provide welcoming ambient stations, re-focussing our customer service staff on how to deliver consistently good customer service. 

5.    Proactively develop and maintain positive working relationships with colleagues across Customer and operational teams. Ensure continuous and effective two-way conversations between Customer and the delivery businesses, prioritising achievement of customer gain points and efficient use of budget to deliver customer focused outcomes.  

6.    Engage with key external stakeholders e.g. customer stakeholder groups, service delivery companies and third-party operators to influence and facilitate the development of the Customer Strategy and delivery of key customer initiatives.

7.    Attendance and contribution to various steering / working / integrated groups, sharing appropriate insight and operational concerns / updates.

8.    Work alongside Customer Experience colleagues from across other modes, sharing and learning from best practice and implementing it consistently across the public transport network.
 

Key interfaces

Internal: 

•    Directors and senior managers within operations and across TfL – communicating consistently what good looks like to customers; acting as a customer experience role model; delivering customer goals and re-engineering processes to meet them; and demonstrating customer focused behaviours to frontline staff
•    Operational teams, understanding their barriers and challenges to success, and using them as your delivery partners
•    Senior customer steering groups – providing information and contributing to Customer Strategy in a coordinated way across TfL, so that delivery plans add together to meet pan-modal customer needs
•    Other leads in Customer - working in partnership to deliver customer-focused, pan-TfL outcomes

External: 

•    Operational delivery partners – e.g. third-party operators
•    Stakeholder groups, including managing directors, directors and senior managers –vigorously and consistently communicating what ‘good’ looks like to customers; acting as customer experience advocates and role models; delivering customer goals and demonstrating customer-focused behaviours to frontline staff
•    Leaders from comparable industries - exchanging information on customer needs and influencing best practice in customer experience

Skills, Knowledge & Experience  

Passionate about customer, you will need to work, often at pace, with stakeholders and delivery partners across multiple disciplines and functions in a connected, collaborative way to embed a customer culture and drive customer-focused improvements.

Skills:

•    Excellent collaboration, influencing and stakeholder management skills (essential) 
•    Strong organisational / programme management skills (essential)
•    Excellent written and oral communication skills, and the ability to adapt your communication style to different audiences (essential) 
•    Political awareness of wider impacts across the organisation and external to the organisation (desirable) 
•    Ability to make evidence-based rational decisions and turn decisions into action (essential)
•    Ability to achieve results through others  (desirable) 
•    Good understanding of customer strategy / business strategy, and ability to translate that for operational colleagues (desirable) 
•    Skilled in analysing and understanding data and trends (essential) 

Knowledge:

•    Strong understanding of TfL’s strategic context and operations or related principles that can be applied from equivalent organisations (essential ) 
•    Understanding of customer strategy and translating it into actionable customer programmes (desirable) 
•    Understanding of the basics of customer behaviour change and how to influence customers (desirable) 
•    Strong practical understanding of business change and project management methodologies and how this can apply to delivery of change in a complex operational environment (desirable )
•    Strong business focus with commitment to driving performance, reliability and financial efficiency (desirable) 
•    Knowledge of the latest customer trends (desirable) 
•    Familiar with the complex transport operating environment, operators’ and customers’ needs. Must demonstrate a market-led approach and empathy with customers  (essential) 
•    A good understanding of social inclusion/exclusion issues, best practice and relevant Government guidelines and legislation (desirable) 

Experience:

•    Demonstrable experience of influencing at a senior level to achieve best customer outcomes (essential) 
•    Proven ability to achieve results through matrixed resources within a complex multi-stakeholder environment (essential) 
•    Experience of navigating a complex, politically driven landscape, and balancing agendas to ensure customer is kept top of mind  (desirable) 
•    Experience of developing, tracking, delivering and evaluating customer programmes and initiatives (desirable) 
•    Experience of developing proposals and presenting to diverse audiences including senior managers, staff and industry partners (essential) 
•    Experience of defining problem statements, root cause analysis and developing strategic approaches to tackle customer pain points (essential) 
 
Equality, diversity and inclusion 
  
We are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion. We want to represent the city we serve, which will help us become a more innovative and efficient organisation. Our goal is to make our recruitment as inclusive as possible. We are a disability confident employer who guarantee an interview to any disabled candidate who meets all of the essential criteria. We also use anonymising software that removes identifying information from CVs and cover letters to make the process fair. 
 
Application Process  
 
•    Please apply using your CV and a two-page covering letter. Think carefully about the skills, knowledge and experience in the advert and cover this in your CV and cover letter. PDF format preferred and do not include any photographs or images

The closing date for applications is 22/04/25 @ 23:59 
 

 
 
 
  
 

Equality, diversity and inclusion

We are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion. We want to represent the city we serve, which will help us become a more innovative and efficient organisation. Our goal is to make our recruitment as inclusive as possible. We are a disability confident employer who guarantee an interview to any disabled candidate who meets all of the essential criteria. 

Benefits  

In return for your commitment and expertise, you will enjoy excellent benefits and scope to grow.  Rewards vary according to the level of role but mostly include the below:
 
Final salary pension scheme 
Free travel for you on the TfL network 
Reimbursement of 75% of the cost of a standard class Ticket for National Rail travel from home or 75% reimbursement on a 28-day flexi ticket
30 days annual leave plus public and bank holidays 
TfL is committed to work-life balance, operating a hybrid working approach where business and role requirements allow
Private healthcare discounted scheme (optional) 
Tax-efficient cycle-to-work programme
Retail, health, leisure and travel offers 
Discounted Eurostar travel