Operations Strategy Lead, Global

Koala is a global furniture brand bringing Australian design and innovation to the world. We create forward-thinking products that solve problems for people and homes everywhere, driven by our purpose to make the world a more comfortable place.

We’ve always believed in doing things differently, whether in the way we develop products, how we do people and culture, or the way we bring the brand to life. That mindset has fuelled our growth, helping us disrupt categories in ways that are creative, bold and often unexpected. While we’re a household name in Australia, our journey on the global stage is only just beginning.

Since launching in 2015, our furniture has reached homes across Australia, Japan, the US and the UK. As a B Corp-certified, customer-obsessed, and data-led company, we’re committed to revolutionising furniture for generations to come through design, innovation, and meaningful sustainability.

Role Description

We’re building something at a genuinely critical moment. We need someone who can think like a CEO, execute like a founder, and make the COO twice as effective.

This isn’t a project management job. It’s not a strategy consultant’s secondment. This is one of the highest-leverage roles in the company. You take our biggest, most complex operational priorities, international expansion, global fulfilment and customer experience at scale, and drive them to board-ready recommendation to real world delivery. You’ll go deep where the COO can’t, build the commercial case for action and push it through the teams that actually ship it. Success means the COO's reach and output doubles.

If this sounds like a lot of responsibility, it is. But if you’re the right person, it’ll also be the most exciting job you’ve ever had.

Key Responsibilities

• Global Operations and Fulfillment Strategy. Develop and own global and local operations and fulfillment strategy. Build strategic distribution models that balance customer experience, growth ambitions, delivery models and cost optimisation to achieve our global goals. Make the trade-offs explicit (modelling how speed, cost and footprint play against each other so leadership can choose deliberately) and design the inventory and network footprint that scales with growth. Working in parallel with the Global Fulfilment Lead and local teams, pressure-test and round out their strategies, providing the models, business cases and decision support that turn strategy into action.

• Customer experience acceleration. End to end order to return customer experience, leverage data, AI, move us to use data to find the highest-leverage CX improvements across the post-purchase and delivery journey, build the case for change, and drive the cross-functional work to ship them.

• International expansion. Lead the analysis and go-to-market groundwork for operational launches into new markets. Develop short, fast and flexible entry strategies with meaningful paths to optimised mid-term structures across supply chain, logistics and operational teams. Assist in selecting and managing local partners (3PLs, distributors, suppliers).

• Opportunity analysis & decision support. Identify, size, and pressure-test growth and operational opportunities across markets and functions. Build the data models, market analyses, and unit economics that turn a hypothesis into a clear go/no-go recommendation for the COO and exec team.

• Business case development. Own the end-to-end business case for major initiatives, financial modelling, scenario analysis, risk assessment, and the investment narrative. Translate complex operational and commercial trade-offs into crisp, decision-ready recommendations.

• Execution & project leadership. Drive priority projects through to delivery by working hand-in-hand with operational, supply chain, commercial, and CX teams. Set milestones, unblock cross-functional friction, hold owners accountable, and report progress against outcomes.

• Commercial & data rigour. Bring a strong commercial lens to every decision, margin, cost-to-serve, payback, and trade-offs. Build and maintain the operational dashboards and metrics that give the COO a real-time read on performance.

• Strategic coordination. Prepare board, exec, and leadership materials; run the operating cadence (planning, reviews, prioritisation) for the COO's remit; and represent the COO's priorities in forums where the COO can't be present.

Ideal background

We care more about evidence than pedigree. We’d expect a number of years experience roughly 7+ years of experience and a clear record of turning strategy into real measurable outcomes. Crucially, this is an operating role, not an advisory one: a strategy or consulting grounding is a great foundation, but we are looking for someone who can has since can be in-house and drive real outcomes, not a pure consultant. The strongest candidates will combine most of the following:

• Physical operations experience (critical). You have worked inside a business that moves physical product (ecommerce preferred) and owned/co-owned the operational metrics that matter: fulfillment, cost-to-serve, delivery performance, inventory, customer experience and the post-purchase journey. You understand supply chain, logistics, and 3PLs from the inside. You can roll up your sleeves and move these levers yourself, not just advise on them.

• Commercial and analytical. Genuine financial and commercial firepower: financial modelling, unit economics, and a data-driven instinct for cost. Comfortable owning a business case end to end, running scenario analysis, and quantifying margin and OPEX impact down to cost-per-order.

• A builder of models and decisions. You turn ambiguity into structure. Sizing opportunities, pressure-testing them, and producing the analysis that takes a hypothesis to a clear go/no-go for the COO and exec team. You build the dashboards and metrics that give leadership a real-time read on performance.

• Process and systems thinker. You can see how operations actually run, find the highest-leverage bottlenecks, and redesign workflows for speed and scale. You design networks and footprints that hold up as the business grows.

• Strategic foundation. A formative grounding in structured problem-solving, likely from early years in strategy, consulting, or corporate strategy. We value this as a base, but it should sit underneath a career of operating and shipping, not be the whole story.

• AI-fluent operator. Hands-on with Claude and the next generation of AI and agentic tools. You don't just bolt AI onto existing processes, you rethink the operating model around it, building automations that make work faster, sharper and more accurate. You're willing to tear down and redesign systems, and you bring others with you.

• Exceptional communicator. You write with clarity, build board- and exec-grade materials, and can distill complexity into a decision in one page.

• High agency and ownership. You move things forward in ambiguity, hold people accountable with warmth, and don't wait to be told what matters. You're happy to challenge and round out others' strategies, not just own your own patch.

You might come from:

• An ecommerce, retail, or DTC operator who started in strategy. You cut your teeth in consulting or corporate strategy early on, then moved in-house to own fulfilment, operations, or growth outcomes in a consumer business.

• A supply chain, fulfilment, or operations leader in consumer/DTC. A senior operating role where you owned operational performance and cost, ideally on a commercial or analytical foundation.

• A commercial project management path with operations exposure. A role where you've solved ambiguous problems and driven projects to delivery, turning messy, cross-functional challenges into shipped outcomes that moved the business forward.

What matters is the combination: proven physical operations experience, real commercial and analytical rigour, AI-native ways of working, and the agency to get hands-on across fulfilment, expansion, and cost. A strategy background helps; on its own, it is not enough.

Treehouse Perks and Privileges

Koala is only great when its employees are happy — and we’re one happy bunch!

• Hybrid working - We’re mixing it up with ~3 days back in the Alexandria Treehouse (office) and work from bed/home (WFB)

• Take a break - Generous time off - volunteer, parental, Koala life leave and more to help keep your work-life balance, balanced.

  Treehouse goods - Fully stocked kitchen with an emphasis on healthy local produce, think bougie brekky, salad bar, kombucha on tap, monthly barbies and more.

• Pet-friendly - The Koala Treehouse is as pet-friendly as they get!

• Surprise & delight - The two-word combo at the core of everything we do. All Koalas can expect to enjoy free Koala products with ‘mates rates’ for your friends and fam.

• Support & wellbeing - Our employee experience respects and embraces all families, formed, found and evolving. You’ll have access to our Employee Assistance Program, which includes unlimited sessions for financial, work, relationship, family or wellbeing support.

• Accelerate your career - via our Learning Management platform Juno, as well as individual and team growth budgets and dedicated days.

• Community & connection - We believe that simply doing ‘no harm’ isn’t good enough So, how are we doing our part? BCorp Certified, WWF Partnership, volunteer days, a member of SoftLanding, 1% and so much more.

All in all, the Koala Kommunity is a great place to hang out and belong to!

Koalities We Look For

At Koala, we do things a little differently and we don’t shy away from the fact that we expect a lot from our employees! We are ambitious. We are curious. We are selfless. We want you to challenge expectations, always look to make a difference and give us something different from the norm. We want people that bring great energy, that have a long-game focus and are always trying to find new angles and approaches to the way we work. We're a team full of entrepreneurial spirit and have a relentless focus on 'what's next' but while always reviewing 'what's been done' and learning, growing and adapting. We're confident, but NEVER arrogant and we adapt to change like Steve Smith under a short ball. Honesty and empathy drive everything we do, as well as a total focus on exceeding our customers’ expectations. So if you feel like this could be you... well what the bloody hell are you waiting for? Drop us a line, and let's see what you've got! ;)

There’s no such thing as a ‘perfect’ candidate, Koala is a place where everyone has opportunity. So however you identify and whatever background you bring with you, please apply if this is a role that would make you excited to come into work every day. We’re an equal opportunity employer, and recognise that a diverse workforce is crucial to our success as a business.

To read more, check out our careers, LinkedIn, or the great work we do with Work180.