Chief Operations Planning

Description

The Chief of Operations Planning at the New York City Transit Authority (NYCT) powers the strategic and tactical planning of Subway and Bus service for over 5 million daily transit customers – the largest system in United States. The selected candidate will lead the ridership intelligence function, providing operational inputs to partners across the MTA; the strategic planning, scheduling, and crewing of subway and bus services, including network redesigns to balance equitable coverage with financial constraints; and customer/community participatory forums. Additionally, the selected candidate will strongly influence cross-jurisdictional/agency/departmental efforts to improve bus services, the capital program, and transit analytics. The Chief is an advocate of continuous improvement and pursuit of the North Star of customer satisfaction, a trusted member of the NYCT President’s senior team, and a strategic partner of the NYCT Departments of Subways and Buses.  

JOB DUTIES

Strategy

• Counsels and advises the President, as a trusted member of the President’s senior team/cabinet, to achieve NYCT’s objective of offering the highest-quality transit services for 5 million New Yorkers each day
• Pursues NYCT’s North Star of customer satisfaction in all activities, including raising customer satisfaction across all modes to 70% by June 2024 and reasserting NYCT’s services as the modes of choice in New York City
• Partners strategically with the Departments of Subways and Buses to leverage data and analytics to supply insights that will increase customer satisfaction and enhance the customer experience, improvs equitable access to transit services, right-size operations, and plan for capital improvements
• Champions flexible, adaptable, and modern approaches to service scheduling and crewing
• Subject matter expert at NYCT on innovation in transportation data collection, planning techniques and analytics, and customer participation
• Represents NYCT’s strategic transportation planning interests in transit and transportation planning regional forums and with internal stakeholders at the MTA

Tactical Duties

• Proactively identifies ways to continuously improve customer satisfaction, as well as the connectivity, planned operational efficiency, and equity of transit services

Ridership

• Leads NYCT’s ridership collection and analysis, including customer travel patterns, ridership forecasts, service needs identification, and recommendations to improve ridership and/or drive cost recovery through customer travel pattern analyses
• Develops ridership projections, fleet requirements, and customer and equity impacts (including Title VI) to inform decision-making with respect to capital investments and service initiatives

Planning/Scheduling  

• Proactively develops and continuously refines key inputs to Bus and Subway operations, including service schedules, crewing needs, and crew work programs
• Modernizes and streamlines operational scheduling, including the adoption of new technology to facilitate transparency and flexible use of planning and scheduling outputs across NYCT
• Closely collaborates with MTA Construction & Development and the Department of Subways to develop track access and service diversion plans that balance the need to provide outstanding weekend/overnight service with the largest capital program in NYCT history
• Oversees bus redesign projects and continuous improvement of bus routing and schedules in all five boroughs; includes the proximate delivery of Queens and Brooklyn bus network redesigns
• Coordinates the development and implementation of cost-effective investment strategies to address performance gaps in current practices and drives to implementation ways NYCT can deliver services while containing costs or proposes new ways to deliver service at lower cost

Influence

• Drives consensus with internal (e.g., MTA Construction & Development) and external stakeholders (e.g., NYCDOT), around cross-jurisdictional efforts that can improve NYCT service delivery (e.g., bus priority lanes, bus amenities, Transit Oriented Development, first/last mile)
• Oversees key inputs to the capital program, including station plans, and participates in the capital planning process to evaluate operational functionality and recommend enhancements for operational effectiveness and intermodal connections
• Serves as the lead subject matter expert on transportation data analysis, prioritizing the analyses and tools built for NYCT by MTA Data & Analytics
• Develops, disseminates, and maintains institutional knowledge of peer transit systems by maintaining relationships with peers and benchmarking, to ensure NYCT provides best-in-class service
• Maintains up-to-date awareness of potential, pending, and current legislation and activist initiatives that may impact NYCT transit plans and implements strategies to influence potential, pending, and current legislation

Customer communication

• Contributes to the success of weekday and weekend, special service, and emergency service delivery by developing detailed service plans, including coordinating customer communications that are timely, accurate and easily understood, and by providing customer support in the field
• Coordinates public participatory forums related to planned service changes. 

Compliance

• Ensures transit service changes comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, supports public hearings and NYCT’s public participation engagements
• Provides operating statistics for submission to FTA to determine capital funds

Management

• Motivates and cultivates talent within Operations Planning, with a focus on innovation, team building, and training the next generation of planners; builds on the success of extant professional development program
• Listens to internal MTA / NYCT customers and creatively supports their efforts to improve transit services
• Selects, supervises, trains, motivates, assigns, counsels, and disciplines staff, in accordance with NYCT policies, establishing professional standards for work quality, quantity, performance, and accountability

Budgetary responsibility

Directs a budget of $30M, including payroll (over 400 staff). Influences an operating budget of approximately $3B and a capital budget of approximately $2B.

Supervisory responsibility

Supervises work of others, including planning, assigning, scheduling, and reviewing work, ensuring quality standards. Is responsible for hiring, terminating, training and developing, reviewing performance, and administering corrective action for staff. Is responsible for managing represented workforce and labor relations with that workforce. Plans organizational structure and job content

WHO YOU ARE 

• You have a deep commitment to improving customer satisfaction and transit service quality
• You are comfortable with decision-making in the context of difficult tradeoffs
• You have strong ability to “zoom in” and “zoom out” of transportation planning problems, being able to dive into details as well as hold executive-level discussions
• You work deftly within a large, matrixed organization
• You possess the knowledge, skills, and abilities outlined below

Knowledge

• Knowledge of transit planning, operations, and scheduling
• Knowledge of program management, policy development and capital program planning

Skills

• Demonstrated experience and success working in a public arena with interest groups, public officials, members of the public, as well as internal partners
• Skilled at working in a collaborative approach across organizational lines to accomplish goals and work objectives in a large organization
• Advanced skills with developing and implementing multi-year strategic plans involving a wide variety of stakeholders
• Strong quantitative background skills including analytical modeling and long-term forecasting
• Demonstrated project management, technical, analytical and presentation skills
• Demonstrated excellent oral and written communication skills 

Abilities

• Ability to communicate complex issues, including complicated service plans, in understandable terms to executive staff, press, elected officials and other governmental or community organizations
• Ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships with individuals and organizations both internal and external to the MTA/NYCT in the public and private sectors, including the Executive Leadership team, members of the Board of Directors, and FTA representatives
• Ability to supervise, train, manage and evaluate staff in compliance with applicable NYCT personnel and labor relations policies, procedures, regulations, and agreements.

QUALIFICATIONS

Minimum Education

Bachelor’s Degree in City/Urban Planning, Engineering, Management, Business Administration, Urban Affairs, Geography, or a closely related field

Minimum Experience

• Experience leading multi-disciplinary teams on complex projects
• Diversified senior level managerial experience in the development and execution of complex and varied programs in large entity (public service delivery, private corporation, non-governmental organization)
• Total number of years’ experience required (15) fifteen years with (10) ten years in a managerial/supervisory capacity.

Preferred Qualifications

Master’s Degree in City/Urban Planning, Engineering, Management, Business Administration, Urban Affairs, Geography, or a closely related field.

COMPENSATION

$182,241 - $261,972 (HAY Points 2056/Executive)

OTHER INFORMATION

Pursuant to the New York State Public Officers Law & the MTA Code of Ethics, all employees who hold a policymaking position must file an Annual Statement of Financial Disclosure (FDS) with the NYS Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government (the “Commission”).

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY

MTA and its subsidiary and affiliated agencies are Equal Opportunity Employers, including with respect to veteran status and individuals with disabilities.

The MTA encourages qualified applicants from diverse backgrounds, experiences, and abilities, including military service members, to apply.