Joint Managing Director – Operations — Subscription-Mobility Portfolio

The mandate

The subscription portfolio places vehicles with households, corporate users and professional drivers under contracts that combine access, maintenance, insurance and replacement. New regulatory interpretation now differentiates leasing, rental and aggregation more sharply, changing documentation, custody and operating responsibility. The present organisation was built around customer segment; consequently the same vehicle may pass through different processes as it is returned, refurbished and reassigned. Evidence is fragmented, availability suffers, and exceptions depend too heavily on experienced depot managers.

The Joint Managing Director will run operations across roughly 900 employees and partners, including fleet planning, vehicle intake, maintenance networks, refurbishment, document control, roadside support and customer operations. A commercial Managing Director remains accountable for propositions and growth. The word “Joint” is meaningful: boundaries will be explicit, disputes will be resolved in a defined forum, and neither executive may optimise their side by transferring cost or risk invisibly to the other.

The task is to construct a compliant vehicle lifecycle with strong service economics. Regulation should be designed into custody, documentation and partner work rather than checked before an inspection. At the same time, every unnecessary day off road consumes capital and disappoints a subscriber. The executive must improve control and availability together.

Why this seat is open

This urgent new role was approved after the regulatory review showed that distributed operational ownership could not deliver the required change. Existing segment heads remain focused on customers and revenue. The board wants a single operations authority in place before new contracts and state requirements take effect, while retaining enough time to pilot the lifecycle model.

What you will own

• Define the operating classification of each proposition with legal and finance, then translate it into vehicle, customer and partner processes.
• Create one vehicle record covering procurement, registration, insurance, custody, usage, maintenance, incidents, refurbishment and disposal.
• Reduce off-road days through planned maintenance, parts availability, network standards and faster approval of legitimate repairs.
• Govern garages, roadside providers and vehicle logistics using outcome measures, evidence rights and enforceable remediation.
• Design hand-offs between commercial, credit, operations and customer support so contract changes cannot create undocumented custody risk.
• Build capacity and shift models for depots based on return and deployment waves rather than historical staffing.
• Establish a fair process for driver or subscriber charges after damage, including evidence, review and appeal.
• Lead operational regulator engagement and readiness demonstrations alongside legal, without presenting rehearsed compliance that ordinary shifts cannot sustain.

The first 12 months

For the first 90 days, follow vehicles through new deployment, routine service, accident repair, early return and reassignment. Quantify downtime by cause, sample custody evidence and review state-level rule variations. Agree a target lifecycle, interim controls for critical gaps and the decision boundary with the commercial Managing Director. Select one depot and one partner network for full-volume pilots.

By month six, the vehicle record and revised workflows should operate across the pilot region, with garage standards and parts planning demonstrably reducing wait time. Train front-line teams on new legal classifications and test comprehension through observed work. Introduce a weekly fleet exception forum that closes issues rather than recirculating them.

At year end, reduce average off-road days by 25%, improve available-fleet utilisation by seven points and achieve 98% completeness for custody and statutory documents. Ninety-five per cent of eligible replacement requests should meet the promised window; disputed damage charges should fall by 35%; and no material regulatory finding should repeat after remediation. The lifecycle model should be deployable across states without bespoke manual control books.

What the board will measure

• Vehicle availability and lifecycle cost by cohort, reconciled with finance and customer commitments.
• Compliance evidence that survives unannounced sampling at depot and partner locations.
• Customer and driver fairness in repair, replacement, return and damage-charge decisions.
• Performance and concentration risk across maintenance and logistics partners.
• Clear, productive boundaries between the joint managing directors.
• An operations leadership bench capable of sustaining the model after the transformation phase.

The person

You bring 28+ years of operating leadership in fleet, leasing, rental, automotive services, aviation ground operations or another regulated asset network. You have managed the whole asset lifecycle and introduced controls that front-line teams could execute at peak volume. Familiarity with vehicle regulation is valuable; the essential evidence is your ability to convert complex obligations into reliable work.

You should have carried operational accountability above ₹3,000 crore and led at least 650 employees and partners. The board will test examples involving service recovery, partner underperformance and a disputed customer charge, alongside your approach to shared executive authority. You must be able to disagree with a commercial peer using facts and then present one decision to the organisation.

This onsite Gurugram appointment entails national depot travel and direct reporting to the Group Chief Executive and board.

Compensation and terms

The anticipated package is ₹5.0–7.5 crore fixed plus performance variable and long-term incentive. Measures will reflect compliant operations, vehicle availability, lifecycle cost, customer outcomes and joint leadership. The role is permanent and onsite in Gurugram, reporting to the Group Chief Executive and board. A notice period up to six months can be accommodated within the implementation sequence.

Confidentiality

Client identity, regulatory interpretations, fleet composition and partner network will be disclosed only to relevant candidates under a signed mutual undertaking. The public facts are rounded and recombined to avoid identification. Do not test the brief with regulators, leasing firms, garages or suspected employees.