Cluster Sales & Service Manager

We support peace and prosperity by building connections, understanding and trust between people in the UK and countries worldwide. For over 90 years we have shaped brighter futures through education, arts, culture, language, and creativity.

We work with people in over 150 countries and reach over 700 million people.

We connect. We inspire.

Role Description, Purpose and Accountabilities

The British Council is seeking an experienced and strategic leader to join us as Cluster Sales & Service Manager, leading customer service and sales operations across multiple centres and countries. This pivotal role is responsible for delivering commercial performance, operational excellence, and a consistently high-quality customer experience that supports the British Council's mission and growth ambitions.

Reporting to senior regional leadership, you will lead a team of Customer Service and Sales Managers, providing clear direction, coaching, and development to build capability, strengthen succession pipelines, and create a culture of accountability and continuous improvement. You will establish and deliver cluster objectives aligned to regional and global priorities, ensuring performance targets, service standards, and customer outcomes are consistently achieved.

Working in close partnership with Teaching, Marketing, Sales, and Operations teams, you will oversee the end-to-end customer journey, ensuring enquiries, registrations, transactions, and complaints are handled efficiently and professionally across all channels. Using customer insights, Voice of the Customer feedback, conversion data, and key performance indicators, you will identify opportunities to improve operational effectiveness, customer satisfaction, retention, and revenue performance.

The role is accountable for driving service and sales performance across the cluster, managing escalated customer issues, implementing service recovery measures, and championing best practice and standardised processes. You will lead workforce planning and resource allocation across multiple locations, ensuring operational resilience, effective coverage, and business continuity.

You will also ensure compliance with safeguarding requirements, financial controls, data protection legislation, and organisational policies, embedding a robust culture of risk management and governance across all customer-facing operations. Regular reporting and analysis of performance trends, risks, opportunities, and improvement initiatives will form an important part of the role.

The successful candidate will bring substantial experience leading customer service, sales, contact centre, education, retail, or service delivery operations across multiple sites, regions, or countries. You will have a proven track record of managing managers, delivering commercial and operational targets, and leading high-performing customer-focused teams within a complex organisational environment.

You will be a confident and credible leader with excellent communication, stakeholder management, and influencing skills, capable of working effectively across a matrix organisation and building strong collaborative relationships. Strong analytical skills are essential, together with the ability to interpret data, identify trends, and translate insight into measurable business improvements.

Candidates should demonstrate expertise in performance management, workforce planning, continuous improvement, customer experience management, and service recovery. Experience of leading change initiatives and driving operational excellence through KPIs and objective-based performance frameworks is highly desirable. An understanding of safeguarding, compliance, data protection, and risk management is essential.

Experience within an international, multicultural, education, training, or language-learning environment would be advantageous. Most importantly, you will share the British Council's commitment to inclusion, quality, and creating outstanding experiences for customers while delivering sustainable organisational growth.

This is an exciting opportunity for an accomplished operational leader to make a significant contribution to customer success, commercial performance, and the future development of the British Council's services across a diverse and dynamic cluster.

Qualifications & Experience

Essential

- English speaking and writing skills at C1 level at least
- Experience of managing Team Leaders or equivalent across multiple countries or locations.
- Demonstrated capability in remote management of diverse teams, ensuring engagement, consistency, and performance at a distance.
- Proven ability to lead large, multi-channel customer service operations, ensuring standards and compliance across markets.
- Track record of managing service performance using KPIs and OKRs across different countries.
- Strong knowledge of safeguarding, data protection, and financial compliance in international customer operations.
- Experience of workforce planning, resource allocation, and operational resilience in multi country contexts.
- Ability to manage escalated customer issues and apply service recovery strategies at scale

Desirable

- Experience of working in international education or training services.
- Proven ability to lead service improvement or transformation projects across multiple countries.
- Strong cultural awareness and ability to work effectively with diverse teams and customers.
- Local language skills (if applicable)

Important Information

- Location:  The position is hybrid, with main location in our London or Edinburgh office
- Contract Type : This is a Full-Time, 12-month contract.
- Salary: PB7, 32,381- 35,324 GBP per annum (Plus an additional £3,300 per annum London Market Allowance if working from the London office).
- Benefits for the UK include, but are not limited to: 32 days annual leave, in addition to public holidays
- 3 days volunteering leave
- Career average defined benefit pension scheme
- An unrivalled opportunity for you to get to use all the experience you’ve built up working in and/or leading global organisations to support us in building trust across the world.

- Right to Work:  The candidates must have legal, non-restricted right to live and work in the UK and currently living in the country of posting. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer any relocation or visa sponsorship.
- Background Screening:  all successful candidates are obliged to undergo comprehensive background screening
- Closing Date: 9th November 2026

A connected and trusted UK in a more connected and trusted world.

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Statement

We are committed to equality, diversity and inclusion and we welcome applications from all sections of the community as we believe that a diverse workforce gives added depth to our work. The British Council is a Disability Confident Employer. The Disability Confident scheme helps challenge attitudes, increase understanding of disability, and ensure staff are drawn from the widest possible pool of talent and we guarantee an interview for disabled applicants who meet the minimum role requirements. We welcome discussions about specific requirements or adjustments to enable participation and engagement in our work and activities.
 
Safeguarding Statement

The British Council is committed to safeguarding children, young people, and adults who we work with. We believe that all children and adults everywhere in the world deserve to live in safe environments and have the right to be protected from all forms of abuse, maltreatment and exploitation as set out in article 19, UNCRC (United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child) 1989. Appointment to positions where there is direct involvement with vulnerable groups will be dependent on thorough checks being completed in line with legal requirements and with the British Council’s Safeguarding policies for Adults and Children.
If you experience any difficulties with submitting your application, please email [email protected]