Chief Operating Officer

Chief Operating Officer / Operating Partner

Industry: Consumer Distribution Company

Salary: $185,000 - $220,000/annually

Location: New York City (Hybrid) + Domestic Travel (~50%)

About the role

Our client, a private‑equity‑backed distribution company, is seeking a senior operating leader to serve as the connective tissue between finance, operations, and the commercial business. This role is designed for a deeply analytical, systems‑oriented executive who thrives on helping others make better decisions—and who takes satisfaction in building structure where intuition has historically ruled.

This role will own the critical operating work flows: validating forecasts, interrogating cash flow assumptions, running business reviews, and coaching division leaders on margins and resource allocation, while ensuring the engine of the business runs with discipline and clarity.

This is not a functional silo role. It is a broad, high‑trust leadership position for someone who can diagnose problems, design durable solutions, and elevate how the organization thinks and operates.

Responsibilities

• Teaching leaders how to understand their numbers and make better decisions themselves.
• Partner with division leaders directly—walking through their P&Ls, connecting daily decisions to financial outcomes, and building the muscle to ask better questions over time.
• Running or co‑running quarterly business reviews with division leaders
• Pressure‑testing budgets and reforecasts before they reach executive leadership
• Developing simple, repeatable analytical frameworks that leaders can actually use
• Diagnosing root causes when performance breaks (systems, people, or process) and building durable fixes
• Owns HR and regulatory compliance—end to end
• Designing and leading a scalable compliance function across multiple entities
• Owning relationships with state liquor authorities and managing brand registrations across ~30 states and multiple importers
• Overseeing HR compliance across states and legal entities, including hiring and managing an experienced HR leader
• Building systems and processes that reduce risk and last‑minute fire drills
• Building governance frameworks for purchasing and pricing that guide better decisions (not approval bottlenecks)
• Partnering with division leaders to understand margin implications of buying behavior
• Connecting purchasing decisions to inventory, working capital, and cash flow
• Improving decision quality by fixing inputs and assumptions, not just managing outcomes
• Supporting sale processes, including QoE prep, management presentations, and data rooms
• Attending quarterly board meetings and ensuring the operating narrative matches the numbers
• Supporting acquisition diligence and post‑close integration when opportunities arise

Requirements

• Senior operating leader (COO, COS, or similar) with experience spanning finance, operations, and analytics
• Strong systems thinker who turns ambiguity into structure
• Trusted partner to commercial leaders; comfortable teaching, questioning, and coaching
• Investor?literate; understands board dynamics and accountability
• Experience in consumer, distribution, or inventory?intensive businesses strongly preferred
• Wine or alcohol experience helpful, but not required
• Ability to travel domestically ~50% of the time or as needed