COO (Chief Operating Officer)

The National Western Center (NWC) is a reimagined 250-acre campus in Denver, Colorado with a vision to be the global destination for food and agricultural discovery. It is the new home of the National Western Stock Show and Colorado State University’s Spur campus. But the future National Western Center isn’t just new buildings. It’s a destination unto itself. It’s a mission-oriented place that will be lively and active all year round — with new events and experiences around every corner.

The opportunity:

NWC is in search of an experienced Chief Operating Officer (COO) who will operationalize the strategy of the National Western Center as a mission-oriented campus and events venue. As a member of the National Western Center Authority executive team, the COO is a leader in the organization and participates in strategic planning and decision making. Under the supervision of the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), the COO directs, administers, and coordinates the activities of the organization in support of policies, goals, and objectives established by the CEO.

NWC’s Chief Operating Officer will be responsible for managing and handling the ongoing business operations of the company, in collaboration with staff to support the day-to-day activity of the campus and organization. This is a multifaceted job with a high degree of accountability rooted in broad and diverse responsibilities. You’ll join a growing, nimble, collaborative, creative, and entrepreneurial team as we accelerate growth of a new events hub and innovation campus in Denver, Colorado.

What you will be doing:

Organization leadership

• Collaborates with the CEO in setting and driving organizational vision and operational strategy
• Translates strategy into actionable goals for performance and growth; helps to implement organization-wide goal setting, performance management, and annual operations planning
• Direct the preparation of short-term and long-range plans and budgets based on broad organizational goals and growth objectives; collaborates with CFO on annual operating and capital budgets
• Evaluates the results of overall operations regularly and reports these results to the CEO and Board of Directors
• Develops and implements policies, procedures, and systems for daily operations, and communicates these changes to department leaders
• Fosters a strong organizational culture

Facilities management

• Ensures operations, maintenance, and programming of the campus assets are successfully meeting and balancing the organization’s mission, quality expectations, and financial needs; develops key performance indicators to benchmark and track progress
• Structures, leads and scales up a team of facility managers and building engineers commensurate with the growth of new campus assets
• Supervises implementation of technology systems to assist in the smooth and efficient flow of information and processes
• Oversees staff and contractors who direct department activities and implement the organization's key operational functions
• Leads the implementation of all sustainability programs, plans, and initiatives to ensure compliance with city and state regulations

Campus wide services

• Maintains and builds trusted relationships with key campus partners, board members, clients, contractors, and stakeholders
• Advises on the assessment of contracts, purchase agreements, vendor relationships, and partner relationships regarding financial agreements for NWC campus operations and potential partner, vendor and contractor agreements relating to the NWC campus, communicating regularly to the NWCA leadership and Board about negotiation progress
• Leverages the economies of scale and associated revenue potential of campus wide services and systems
• Assesses and advises on potential partnerships or business model additions or changes including any partnering opportunities regarding real estate, operations, programming, or asset management on the NWC campus

Event sales and operations

• Leads the NWC team to achieve a world-class standard of performance for event venues
• Pursues an aggressive ramp-up strategy for revenue generation, primarily through event operations, focused on growing on-campus activity
• Manages the event sales and operations team throughout the entire life cycle of events – from client cultivation through close out
• Models projected event activity including proposal pipeline and financial forecast