COO Jobs in Maryland

Director of Operations

Lauren’s Garden Service | Cultivate Garden & Goods | Nursery Operations

Position Summary

The Director of Operations is responsible for turning the owner’s vision, priorities, and goals into consistent day-to-day execution across the company.

This position oversees the operational performance of the landscape, nursery, and retail divisions and manages the leaders responsible for those departments. The Director of Operations creates accountability, improves systems, analyzes labor and productivity, ensures deadlines are met, and provides the owner with clear data and recommendations.

The goal of this position is to remove day-to-day operational management from the owner’s plate so the owner can focus on company strategy, financial oversight, business development, high-level marketing, major landscape sales/design, and growth.

Primary Responsibilities

Leadership & Manager Accountability

• Manage and coach department managers and supervisors.
• Establish clear expectations, priorities, deadlines, and measurable goals.
• Hold weekly operations/accountability meetings with managers.
• Track commitments and ensure assigned tasks are completed.
• Identify recurring performance or organizational problems and develop solutions.
• Help managers prioritize, delegate, organize their workload, and use their teams effectively.
• Address performance problems rather than allowing missed expectations to continue.
• Develop stronger supervisors and future leaders within the company.

Labor & Productivity

• Analyze labor hours and labor cost relative to sales and workload.
• Determine appropriate staffing levels for each department.
• Identify whether workload problems are caused by inadequate staffing, poor delegation, inefficient processes, or time-management issues.
• Recommend hiring or schedule changes based on data rather than anecdotal reports that a department is "too busy."
• Monitor overtime, scheduling efficiency, productivity, and labor-to-sales ratios.
• Ensure managers appropriately delegate work to associates rather than performing tasks that can be handled by lower-cost team members.

Retail & Nursery Operations

Oversee the operational execution of Cultivate Garden & Goods and nursery operations, including:

• Staffing and scheduling
• Inventory accuracy and shrink controls
• Inventory adjustments and cycle counts
• Purchasing systems and ordering deadlines
• Seasonal merchandising
• Receiving and product flow
• Store standards and organization
• Customer-service standards
• POS procedures and reporting
• Event and class execution
• Promotional calendars and deadlines
• Coordination between marketing, purchasing, merchandising, and operations

Create systems so major seasonal events, classes, product launches, and promotions are planned well in advance rather than managed reactively.

Landscape Operations

Oversee operational performance of the landscape division in partnership with landscape leadership and project managers.

Responsibilities include:

• Crew capacity and staffing
• Production scheduling
• Job readiness
• Materials and purchasing
• Project workflow
• Project-manager pipeline and backlog
• Estimates and proposals moving through the system
• Job confirmations
• Crew productivity
• Communication between project managers and field teams
• Timely job completion and billing
• Tools, trucks, equipment, and operational needs

The Director of Operations does not need to personally design landscapes or perform project-management work but must understand the workflow well enough to identify bottlenecks and hold the team accountable.

Systems & Process Improvement

• Evaluate existing company systems and identify gaps.
• Develop SOPs, checklists, calendars, reporting systems, and repeatable processes.
• Reduce dependence on the owner reminding employees about recurring responsibilities.
• Create systems that make important deadlines visible and difficult to miss.
• Improve communication and handoffs between departments.
• Identify repetitive problems and solve the underlying process rather than repeatedly addressing the symptom.
• Simplify operations wherever possible.

KPI & Financial Reporting

Develop and maintain a simple weekly operations scorecard for the owner.

Potential metrics include:

• Sales by department
• Labor dollars and labor percentage
• Scheduled labor hours
• Sales per labor hour
• Landscape backlog
• Estimates outstanding
• Proposals sent
• Jobs sold/confirmed
• Production capacity
• Inventory adjustments/shrink
• Staffing vacancies
• Event/class ticket sales
• Purchasing deadlines
• Major overdue tasks
• Manager commitments from the previous week

The Director of Operations should not simply report numbers but should explain what the numbers indicate and recommend action when needed.

Hiring & Team Development

• Identify staffing needs.
• Ensure managers recruit before departments become understaffed.
• Participate in hiring for key operational positions.
• Improve onboarding and training systems.
• Help managers establish clear roles for employees.
• Ensure performance expectations are communicated and documented.
• Build succession and leadership capacity within each department.

Events & Marketing Execution

The owner may establish overall marketing direction, promotions, and major initiatives.

The Director of Operations is responsible for ensuring the operational team executes them.

Examples include:

• Classes listed and promoted according to established timelines
• Products and materials ordered on time
• Displays completed before events
• Staffing scheduled appropriately
• Marketing assets and information delivered to the appropriate person
• Ticket sales reviewed early enough to make adjustments
• Post-event performance reviewed

Relationship With the Owner / CEO

The Owner/CEO retains primary responsibility for:

• Company vision and strategy
• Major financial decisions
• Overall budget
• Major compensation decisions
• Major hiring decisions
• Brand and marketing direction
• Business development
• Major landscape sales and design
• Expansion opportunities
• Property/real-estate decisions

The Director of Operations owns execution.

Rather than bringing operational problems to the owner without a solution, the Director should ideally present:

What is happening → what the data shows → why it is happening → recommended solution → what decision is needed from the owner.

Decision-Making Authority

The Director of Operations should have authority to make routine operational decisions without waiting for owner approval.

Examples include:

• Adjusting schedules
• Changing workflows
• Establishing procedures
• Holding managers accountable
• Delegating responsibilities
• Recommending staffing changes
• Setting operational deadlines
• Requiring reporting and documentation
• Correcting inefficient systems

Major financial commitments, compensation changes, senior-level hiring/firing, major policy changes, and strategic decisions remain with the owner.

First 90-Day Priorities

During the first 90 days, the Director of Operations should:

• Learn each department and understand existing workflows.
• Meet individually with managers and supervisors.
• Review staffing levels, labor hours, schedules, sales, and productivity.
• Establish weekly manager accountability meetings.
• Establish a company operations scorecard.
• Build a staffing and labor analysis by department.
• Create a calendar for major events, purchasing deadlines, promotions, and seasonal transitions.
• Establish reliable inventory-count and adjustment procedures.
• Review the landscape project-management pipeline and production capacity.
• Identify the biggest operational bottlenecks and present recommended solutions.
• Clarify responsibilities between managers, supervisors, associates, and the Director of Operations.
• Begin transferring routine operational follow-up and accountability away from the owner.

Ideal Candidate

The ideal candidate has significant multi-unit retail, regional-management, operations, or comparable leadership experience and has previously:

• Managed managers rather than only individual employees
• Been responsible for labor budgets and productivity
• Worked with P&L or departmental financial performance
• Managed hiring, staffing, scheduling, and performance
• Used KPIs to make operational decisions
• Managed inventory and shrink
• Implemented systems and SOPs
• Held teams accountable to deadlines and standards
• Improved underperforming operations
• Managed multiple priorities or departments simultaneously

The candidate must also be comfortable working in a growing small business where systems may need to be created rather than simply followed.

Experience in landscaping or horticulture is helpful but not required if the candidate demonstrates the ability to learn the economics and workflow of the landscape division.

Key Characteristics

• Highly organized
• Strong follow-through
• Comfortable holding people accountable
• Data-driven
• Calm and decisive
• Good at prioritization
• Strong manager of managers
• Able to delegate
• Comfortable addressing performance problems
• Process-oriented
• Financially literate
• Able to move between strategy and details
• Comfortable building systems from scratch
• Proactive rather than reactive
• Communicates clearly with the owner
• Brings solutions, not simply problems

Pay: $105,000.00 - $145,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• 401(k)
• 401(k) matching
• Dental insurance
• Employee discount
• Health insurance
• Paid time off
• Retirement plan
• Vision insurance

Work Location: In person