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Admin · Los Angeles, CA · Hybrid

Director of Operations

The Role

Single Grain is hiring a Senior Director of Operations to lead operational transformation across the company.

We are evolving from a traditional digital marketing agency into a lean, AI-enabled services and product organization designed for scale, efficiency, and measurable business impact. This role exists to architect that transition.

You will be responsible for strengthening operational infrastructure, improving profitability, increasing revenue efficiency, and leading company-wide AI integration. This is a mission-critical leadership position with direct accountability for financial performance, operational rigor, and AI-driven leverage across the organization.

If you are looking for a comfortable executive seat,  this is not it. If you want to build the operating system behind a high-performance, AI-enabled agency - read on.

Measurable financial improvement is expected within the first two quarters.

About Single Grain

Single Grain is a fast-moving, award-winning, AI-driven digital marketing agency. We’ve been helping top brands like Amazon, Uber, and Salesforce grow since 2009. We specialize in Paid Media, SEO, Content Marketing, CRO, and more - powered by a lean, high-performing team focused on smart, impactful work.

We don’t just use AI, we build it. We’ve created proprietary AI tools including Karrot.ai,  an AI-powered performance marketing system that generates ads, landing pages, and campaign assets in seconds, and, ClickFlow,  an AI-driven SEO experimentation platform that helps teams identify content opportunities, optimize pages, and increase organic traffic through systematic testing and workflow automation.

These tools aren’t side projects, they’re embedded into how we operate and how we serve clients.

We practice what we preach: our podcast has 150+ million downloads, and more than 193,000 marketers subscribe to our YouTube channel.

We move quickly, push hard, and expect a lot from ourselves and each other. AI isn’t just a tool we use,  it’s core to how we operate, from creative to strategy to execution. Our long-term vision is to build a small but elite team that stays lean, scrappy, and relentlessly focused on tech-enabled innovation and measurable business impact.

We don’t micromanage. We don’t hire people who need their hands held. But we do collaborate deeply, give honest feedback, and leave space for mistakes, growth, and iteration. No egos, no fluff, just people who care about doing great work and supporting each other.

What You’ll Do

  • Improve revenue efficiency across the organization

  • Expand net margin through structural improvements

  • Install financial visibility and reporting systems

  • Drive utilization, pricing discipline, and service-line profitability

  • Build and enforce accountability metrics across leadership

  • Implement AI-driven automation across operations and delivery

  • Increase company-wide AI fluency

  • Redesign org structure where necessary to align with profitability

  • Address underperformance quickly and directly

  • Build operational systems that scale without unnecessary headcount growth

  • Remove the CEO from day-to-day operational firefighting

Non-Negotiable Requirements

  • Put “AI is cool” as the first line of your cover letter or subject line, or your application will not be reviewed.

  • Digital marketing agency experience

  • Prior ownership of agency P&L

  • Demonstrated improvement of contribution margin by client or service line

  • Proven track record scaling or stabilizing a services business

  • Advanced AI fluency (Power User level)

    • AI experience is not optional.

You must demonstrate hands-on capability in:

  • AI-driven financial modeling

  • Operational automation systems

  • Prompt workflow design

  • AI process innovation

  • AI tool implementation across teams

  • Strategic AI thinking at the executive level

If you are “AI-curious” but have not personally built or implemented systems,  this role is not a fit.

Ideal Profile

You are:

  • A systems thinker, not a task manager

  • Financially rigorous and margin-obsessed

  • Comfortable confronting underperformance immediately

  • Biased toward action - you ship fast

  • Calm under pressure

  • Capable of upgrading talent and building bench strength

  • Viewed as both a stabilizer and an enforcer

  • Strategically sharp with operational depth

What We Do NOT Want

  • Pure project managers

  • Operators without agency experience

  • Corporate bureaucrats without hands-on scaling experience

  • Politically cautious leaders who avoid direct confrontation

  • AI novices or surface-level users

Interview Process

We will aggressively screen for:

  • Quantified margin improvement stories

  • Revenue efficiency improvements (before/after metrics)

  • AI systems personally built or led

  • Handling of underperformance and accountability enforcement

  • Organizational redesign under pressure

Finalists will complete:

  • Strategic working session

  • Live AI capability demonstration

  • Financial modeling walkthrough

Compensation & Structure

Reports to: CEO
Team Size: ~30 FTE

Location: Los Angeles (Hybrid - M/T/W in office)

Base Salary: $175,000–$200,000
Performance Incentives: Tied directly to:

  • Revenue efficiency growth

  • Net margin expansion

  • AI-driven efficiency gains

  • Upside directly correlates to measurable financial impact.

Department
Admin
Locations
Los Angeles, CA
Remote status
Hybrid
Admin · Los Angeles, CA · Hybrid

Director of Operations

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