Strategic Venue Director - SEC

Strategic Venue Director - SEC

up to £110,000 per annum plus benefits

Role Purpose:

The Strategic Venue Director provides senior leadership across catering, hospitality, premium, retail and event operations at the Scottish Event Campus.

The role is responsible for shaping long term vision, driving commercial growth and embedding sustainable transformation, while providing strategic oversight and assurance of operational excellence. Working in close partnership with the Business Director and SEC Client leadership, the role plays a pivotal part in positioning the venue for future growth, innovation and market leadership.

This is a future focused role with reduced emphasis on day to day operational management and increased accountability for strategy, growth, partnerships and leadership maturity.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

Strategic Vision & Transformation

• Set and deliver a clear long term strategy for catering and hospitality across conferences, exhibitions, premium and retail operations.
• Lead venue wide strategic planning, ensuring alignment with client ambition, Levy priorities and sustainability commitments.
• Act as a trusted strategic partner to the Client, contributing to broader venue and campus wide discussions beyond catering delivery.
• Use market insight, customer data and competitor analysis to keep the SEC ahead of industry trends.
• Present strategic recommendations and investment cases to senior stakeholders, supported by robust commercial and performance data.

Commercial Growth & Partnerships

• Design and execute growth strategies to increase revenue, spend per head and commercial returns across all hospitality formats.
• Identify and develop new commercial opportunities including partnerships, experiential concepts and innovation initiatives.
• Lead strategic pricing, revenue optimisation and margin improvement programmes.
• Collaborate with Sales, Marketing, Culinary, E15 Insights, Projects and Commercial teams to deliver compelling go-to-market propositions.
• Position the SEC as a benchmark venue within the UK events and hospitality market through differentiated commercial strategies.

Strategic Operational Oversight & Guest Experience

• Provide senior oversight and assurance of operational readiness, quality and consistency across all events.
• Set clear standards for food, service, sustainability and compliance, holding operational leaders accountable for delivery.
• Champion a guest-first culture, ensuring hospitality excellence is embedded across the venue.
• Maintain strong governance across Health & Safety, food safety and brand standards.

Performance, Efficiency & Continuous Improvement

• Introduce and embed data-led KPIs to drive productivity, quality and financial performance.
• Lead cross-functional process improvement initiatives to simplify ways of working and improve effectiveness.
• Champion the adoption of technology and innovation to support smarter planning, labour deployment and service delivery.

Leadership & Culture

• Lead, inspire and develop a high-performing senior leadership team capable of operating with autonomy and commercial accountability.
• Shape venue structures that flex to event demand and complexity.
• Mentor future leaders and support succession planning to build long-term resilience.
• Role-model Levy leadership behaviours, fostering a culture of trust, accountability and innovation.

WHAT GREAT LOOKS LIKE:

Experience

• Significant senior leadership experience within complex, high-profile hospitality, events, catering, retail or venue environments, ideally across multi use or large scale venues.
• Proven track record of shaping and delivering long-term strategic vision alongside commercial growth, transformation and operational excellence.
• Experience operating at executive and board level, presenting strategic recommendations, business cases and performance insights to senior stakeholders and clients.
• Demonstrated success leading change programmes, innovation initiatives and growth strategies that deliver sustainable commercial and guest experience outcomes.
• Strong background working within matrixed organisations, collaborating across commercial, operational and functional teams to deliver shared objectives.
• Experience managing senior stakeholder relationships in demanding, high-visibility environments, acting as a trusted advisor rather than solely a delivery lead.

Knowledge, Skills & Professional Capability

• Highly developed strategic thinking and analytical capability, with the ability to translate insight, data and market intelligence into clear, executable plans.
• Strong commercial and financial acumen, including experience building investment cases, pricing strategies, revenue optimisation models and margin improvement plans.
• Confident using data, performance metrics and customer insight (e.g. E15-style analytics) to drive decision making, performance improvement and growth.
• Deep understanding of guest experience design, premium hospitality, retail and event operations within a modern venue context.
• Strong grasp of sustainability, technology enablement and innovation as drivers of long-term venue performance and competitive advantage.
• Excellent communication, influencing and negotiation skills, with the credibility to operate effectively at board, client leadership and partner level.

Leadership & Personal Attributes

• Senior, credible leader with the presence and judgement to operate at enterprise level while maintaining a strong connection to delivery standards.
• Collaborative and inclusive leadership style, able to align diverse teams and stakeholders behind a shared strategic direction.
• Passionate about developing leaders and building high performing, strategically minded teams with strong commercial accountability.
• Comfortable operating in fast paced, high profile environments with competing priorities and complex stakeholder dynamics.
• Resilient, adaptable and forward thinking, with a strong appetite for innovation, continuous improvement and "jumping the curve" rather than preserving the status quo.
• Role models Levy values and leadership behaviours, fostering a culture of trust, accountability, psychological safety and ambition.