Vice President – National Operations (COO)

Vice President – National Operations (COO )

Location: Gurgaon (Head Office) | Extensive Pan-India Travel

Company: India Fashion World (IFW)

About India Fashion World

India Fashion World (IFW) is one of India's leading fashion and lifestyle exhibition companies, organizing premium shopping exhibitions across the country.

Today, IFW successfully executes 16+ large-format exhibitions every month across multiple cities. Our next milestone is ambitious—we are building the country's largest fashion exhibition network by scaling to 30–32 exhibitions every month over the next few years.

This scale requires an exceptional operations leader who can build systems, lead large teams, and create a world-class execution engine.

We are looking for a Vice President – National Operations (COO Designate) to lead this transformation.

This role reports directly to the Founders and offers the opportunity to build one of India's most sophisticated exhibition operations networks.

About the Role

As the Vice President – National Operations, you will own the complete operational ecosystem of India Fashion World.

You will be responsible for building, leading and continuously improving a nationwide operations function covering multiple cities, multiple warehouses, multiple vendors and multiple exhibition teams operating simultaneously across India.

You will directly manage Regional Operations Heads for:

• North India
• South India
• East India
• West India

Each Regional Head will be responsible for execution within their respective geography, while you will ensure operational excellence across the entire country.

You will build the systems, people and processes that enable IFW to successfully double its operational scale over the coming years.

Key ResponsibilitiesNational Operations Leadership

• Own end-to-end operations for all exhibitions across India.
• Build scalable operational systems capable of supporting 30+ exhibitions every month.
• Develop and implement national SOPs across every operational function.
• Establish operational benchmarks and quality standards.
• Build a highly disciplined execution culture across the organization.

Regional Leadership

Lead and mentor Regional Operations Heads across India.

Your responsibilities include:

• Hiring and developing regional leadership teams.
• Weekly operational reviews.
• Performance management.
• KPI monitoring.
• Resource planning.
• Cross-region coordination.
• Leadership coaching.
• Building succession plans.

End-to-End Exhibition Operations

Oversee every aspect of exhibition execution including:

• Venue planning
• Site inspections
• Layout execution
• Stall setup and dismantling
• Vendor coordination
• Material movement
• Branding installation
• Customer experience
• Exhibitor experience
• Registration flow
• Security
• Housekeeping
• Emergency preparedness
• Event-day execution
• Post-event dismantling

Ensure every exhibition is delivered on time, within budget and at premium quality standards.

Supply Chain, Logistics & Warehousing

Lead the national movement of exhibition assets.

Responsibilities include:

• National warehouse planning.
• Inventory control.
• Asset lifecycle management.
• Dispatch planning.
• Transportation optimization.
• Reverse logistics.
• Equipment maintenance.
• Procurement planning.
• Vendor negotiations.

Develop systems that reduce operational costs while improving speed and reliability.

Financial & Commercial Management

Work closely with Finance to drive operational profitability.

Responsible for:

• Annual operational budgets.
• Vendor commercial negotiations.
• Procurement strategy.
• Cost optimisation.
• Operational P&L.
• Expense control.
• MIS reporting.
• Forecasting.
• Regional profitability reviews.

Develop data-driven decision-making across operations.

Technology & Digital Transformation

Drive technology adoption across the organization.

Experience with the following is highly desirable:

• Zoho CRM
• ERP systems
• Warehouse Management Systems (WMS)
• Inventory Management Software
• Project Management Platforms
• Google Workspace
• Advanced Excel dashboards
• Business Intelligence reporting

Champion automation, process digitization and operational visibility across the organization.

Vendor Ecosystem

Build and manage IFW's nationwide operational partner network.

This includes:

• Fabricators
• Logistics partners
• Transport companies
• Printers
• Venue partners
• Temporary staffing agencies
• Event contractors
• Security agencies

Develop long-term partnerships while ensuring best-in-class commercial terms and service quality.

Process Excellence

Continuously improve:

• SOPs
• Checklists
• Quality standards
• Vendor scorecards
• Cost efficiencies
• Team productivity
• Operational dashboards
• Risk management frameworks
• Compliance systems

Create repeatable systems that allow the organization to scale without increasing operational complexity.

Leadership & Culture

Build and lead a high-performance national operations organization.

You will be responsible for approximately 40–100+ team members across India through Regional Operations Heads and city-level operations teams.

Develop leaders, build accountability and create an execution-first culture.

Ideal Candidate

We are looking for someone with:

• 10–15+ years of leadership experience in Operations.
• Proven experience managing large multi-city or Pan-India operations.
• Strong background in Retail Operations, Supply Chain, Logistics, Warehousing, Hospitality, Multi-location Businesses, Events or Large Consumer Brands.
• Experience leading teams across multiple states.
• Strong commercial and financial acumen.
• Excellent negotiation and vendor management skills.
• Expertise in logistics planning and execution.
• Experience building operational SOPs and scalable systems.
• Hands-on exposure to CRM, ERP and operational technology platforms.
• Strong analytical mindset with exceptional problem-solving abilities.
• High ownership and entrepreneurial mindset.
• Ability to thrive in a fast-growing, high-accountability environment.

Preferred Industry Experience

Candidates from organizations such as:

• Reliance Retail
• Trent (Westside & Zudio)
• Lifestyle International
• Shoppers Stop
• D-Mart
• IKEA
• Decathlon
• FirstCry
• Home Centre
• Croma
• Lulu Group
• Amazon
• Flipkart
• Delhivery
• Blue Dart
• DHL
• DTDC
• BookMyShow Live
• Wizcraft
• E-Factor Experiences
• Percept
• Seventy EMG
• Exhibition organisers
• Large-format retail chains
• Hospitality groups
• Supply chain and logistics companies

Professionals from any organization that manages complex, multi-location operations at scale are encouraged to apply.

What Success Looks Like

Within your first 12–18 months, you will have:

• Successfully built a scalable national operations framework.
• Established Regional Operations Heads across India.
• Standardized execution through robust SOPs.
• Created complete operational visibility through dashboards and technology.
• Improved operational efficiency while reducing costs.
• Built a high-performing national operations team.
• Successfully enabled IFW to scale from 16 exhibitions per month to 30+ exhibitions per month without compromising execution quality.

Why Join India Fashion World?

This is not just another operations leadership role.

This is an opportunity to build India's largest fashion and lifestyle exhibition operations platform from the ground up.

You will work directly with the founders, shape the future of the organization, build teams across the country and play a pivotal role in one of the fastest-growing businesses in the exhibitions industry.

If you are passionate about building systems, leading people, solving operational challenges and creating businesses that scale nationally, we'd love to hear from you.

Compensation

Leadership compensation will be among the best in the industry and is not a constraint for the right candidate. We are looking for exceptional talent capable of building a nationally scalable operations organization.