COO – Regional Operations — Refining And Marketing System

The mandate

Incompatible regional operating models across a refining and marketing system prevent the executive committee from seeing capacity, asset constraints, customer commitments and supplier interfaces in one delivery language.

The new COO will lead an approximately £42,850 million operated asset and trading perimeter and influence around 1,100 employees and material partners. The system joins refining, storage, distribution, commercial channels and enabling functions whose outages or poorly sequenced changes can propagate quickly. The mandate is not to centralise every decision; it is to make accountabilities, interfaces and operating standards sufficiently consistent that capacity can move and performance can be compared.

Based onsite in London, the COO reports to the Group Chief Executive or designated executive committee sponsor. The first-year outcome must be one operating system, reliable service and scalable capacity, demonstrated through a recovered project rather than documented as an aspiration.

Why this seat is open

This is a planned new role authorised within the next operating model. Regional operations executives remain accountable for current delivery and no incumbent is being replaced. The missing layer is enterprise authority over cross-region standards, capacity and the recovery portfolio. A four-to-six-month appointment process is timed to precede the next capital and talent cycle.

What you will own

• Establish the factual recovery baseline for the major programme, including completed scope, remaining critical path, cost to complete, operational dependencies and benefit erosion.
• Decide which operating processes must be common across regions and where asset, regulatory or customer conditions justify controlled variation.
• Introduce integrated planning across maintenance, production, inventory, logistics, customer commitments and project cutovers, making resource contention visible early.
• Reset accountabilities between programme leaders, asset teams, regional executives and functions so that every recovery decision has one owner and escalation clock.
• Protect safety, product quality and continuity while sequencing changes; reject schedule recovery created by transferring risk into operations or the supply chain.
• Build a capacity model covering employees, contractors, shutdown windows, specialist capability and supplier constraints, then link it to portfolio acceptance.
• Standardise operational performance definitions and data ownership so regional comparisons lead to action rather than argument over reconciliation.
• Strengthen the regional operations bench, addressing leaders who optimise local results at the expense of system performance and developing successors for critical seats.

The first 12 months

The opening 60 days should produce an independently tested view of the programme. Visit the affected operations, challenge reported completion and speak with the teams expected to absorb the new processes. Separate irreversible commitments from choices still available, and identify customer or integrity obligations that constrain the recovery sequence.

By day 100, agree a rebaselined plan with the board. It must show decision gates, schedule range, cost-to-complete range, operational readiness and explicit stop conditions. Install a weekly recovery room where evidence is current, regional leaders attend with authority and unresolved cross-functional issues have a dated escalation.

Months four through eight should deliver the first safe recovery milestones while implementing the common operating system in the participating regions. Introduce integrated capacity planning, common service measures and formal exception ownership. Redirect or stop lower-value initiatives that compete for the same scarce resources.

At year-end, the major programme should be tracking within its approved range, service performance should be stable or improving, and the organisation should have a repeatable method for accepting and delivering cross-regional change. The following year’s portfolio must be capacity-backed rather than assembled from independent promises.

What the board will measure

• Recovery milestones achieved within the rebaselined schedule range and cost-to-complete variance held below 10%.
• Customer service and product-quality measures maintained through major cutovers, with no hidden backlog used to protect reported performance.
• A 30% reduction in aged cross-regional operating decisions and named owners for every critical interface.
• Capacity validation completed before approval for 100% of material new initiatives entering the operating portfolio.
• Common performance definitions adopted across all participating regions, with reconciliation effort reduced by at least 40%.
• Ninety per cent retention of critical operational talent and ready-now succession for 70% of direct reports.

The person

You are a Regional COO, Operations President or Delivery Executive with 22–28 years in refining, marketing, chemicals, terminals, logistics, utilities or another interdependent operating network. You have recovered a major programme while maintaining live service and can distinguish genuine progress from scope reclassification or deferred operational work.

The scale threshold is a £24,850 million P&L, book, budget or accountable portfolio and leadership of at least 950 people. You have led across regional boundaries, integrated contractors and suppliers, and made difficult calls where schedule, cost, customer and integrity needs conflicted.

This role is onsite in London with international relocation supported. Frequent presence across the operating network is expected, especially during recovery gates and cutovers.

Compensation and terms

The indicative reward is £290,000–390,000 base plus annual incentive and LTI. Final positioning will recognise accountable scale, recovery record and current mix. Long-term awards are governed by usual vesting, performance and conduct provisions, with notice up to six months considered.

Confidentiality

The enterprise, regions, assets, customers and recovery plan are anonymised to protect operating continuity. Detailed disclosure follows evidence of fit, reciprocal interest and signed confidentiality commitments.