Head of Operations

Job summary

Lead end-to-end delivery of linguistic validation and translation projects while systematizing operations to scale the business. Manage the operations team, track key performance metrics, and ensure quality alignment with ISPOR and ISO standards.

Job details

About Cethos Cethos is a Calgary-based life-sciences language company specializing in linguistic validation, Clinical Outcome Assessments (COA/eCOA), cognitive debriefing, and clinician review, alongside certified translation in 200+ languages. We help CROs, pharma, biotech, medical device companies, and eCOA platform vendors run submission-ready, ISPOR-aligned translation and validation programs across global clinical trials. The Role You'll be our first dedicated operations leader, working alongside the founders at our downtown Calgary headquarters and owning delivery end to end: every project that comes in — linguistic validation, cognitive debriefing, clinician review, certified translation — leaves on time, on quality, and on margin. Today that machinery is run day-to-day by the founders; your job is to take it over, systematize it, and build the team that scales it. We especially welcome candidates who built their operations career internationally — at a language service provider, CRO, or BPO abroad — and are now based in Canada. What You'll Do Own delivery across all service lines: intake, scheduling, resourcing, quality gates, and on-time handoff to clients, across concurrent multi-language projects. Lead and grow the operations team — project managers and coordinators in Calgary and remote — including hiring, training, and performance. Define and track the numbers that matter: on-time delivery, turnaround times, gross margin per project, rework rates, and client escalations. Own the operating system: workflows in our in-house project portal, automation of repetitive steps, and clear escalation paths for at-risk projects. Own quality in practice — QA gates for cognitive debriefing and clinician review reports, corrective actions run to closure, and audit-ready documentation aligned with ISPOR good practices and our ISO 17100 certification program. Plan vendor capacity with our vendor management function so the linguist, interviewer, and clinician network is ahead of the pipeline. Partner with business development on scoping and capacity, so every commitment we sell is one we can deliver. What You Need 5+ years in operations or production at a language service provider, CRO, or comparable deadline-driven professional-services environment, including 2+ years leading a team — Canadian or international experience equally welcome. Hands-on familiarity with translation production workflows; direct linguistic validation or COA/clinical translation experience is a strong advantage. A builder's track record: processes you created, metrics you moved, teams you grew. Comfort managing a distributed team and freelance network across languages and time zones. Excellent written and spoken English, and calm, professional communication under deadline pressure. Ability to work on-site at our downtown Calgary office (421 7th Ave SW) and legal authorization to work in Canada. Nice to Have Familiarity with ISPOR / ISOQOL good-practice methodology for COA translation and cognitive debriefing. Experience preparing for or operating under ISO 17100 or ISO 9001. Experience with a TMS or CAT environment (XTM, memoQ, Trados, Phrase, or similar). Additional working languages. What We Offer Real scope: the senior delivery seat, reporting directly to the founders, with a mandate to build rather than maintain. Meaningful work: the instruments and documents we handle end up in front of patients and regulators in active clinical trials. A modern stack: our automation-heavy in-house portal handles the repetitive work, so your team's time goes into judgment, not admin. Benefits plan including group health and dental coverage; downtown office steps from the CTrain. Full posting and application: https://www.cethos.com/en/careers/head-of-operations-calgary Cethos is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applications from all qualified candidates and are happy to provide accommodation during the recruitment process on request.

What you’ll do

Lead end-to-end delivery of linguistic validation and translation projects while systematizing operations to scale the business. Manage the operations team, track key performance metrics, and ensure quality alignment with ISPOR and ISO standards.

Requirements

Requires 5+ years of operations experience in a language service provider or CRO, including at least 2 years of team leadership. Must have hands-on familiarity with translation production workflows and legal authorization to work in Canada.

Benefits

• Group Health Coverage • Dental Coverage

Listed skills

• Process Optimization · Preferred
• Quality assurance · Preferred
• Operations Management · Preferred
• Team Leadership · Preferred
• Project management · Preferred
• Stakeholder Management · Preferred
• Workflow Automation · Preferred

Other relevant skills

Identified from the job description. Confirm important requirements above.

• Operations Management
• Project Management
• Linguistic Validation
• Clinical Outcome Assessments
• Resource Planning
• Quality Assurance
• Vendor Management
• Process Optimization
• Team Leadership
• Budget Management
• Workflow Automation
• ISO 17100 Compliance
• ISPOR Methodology
• TMS/CAT Tools
• Stakeholder Management
• Performance Tracking

Job areas

• Management & Leadership
• Healthcare
• Science & Research
• Consulting
• Manufacturing