Under-the-Radar Ops Roles

Recruiters are surfacing more operations jobs that sit below the usual founder-and-engineer spotlight, including heads of operations and hands-on specialists who build basic business systems. Two recent posts pointed to a Head of Operations opening at Jude and a remote Operations Specialist role paying $30 to $35 an hour for procurement and enterprise resource planning data work. (x.com; x.com) The Jude listing was framed as a Head of Operations hire, a title that usually combines process design, cross-functional coordination, and day-to-day execution inside a growing company. The other opening described an Operations Specialist handling procurement workflows and enterprise resource planning, or ERP, records, with a posted pay band of $30 to $35 an hour and remote work. (x.com; x.com; workable.com) Those are not niche tasks inside a startup. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics says management occupations are projected to grow faster than the average for all occupations from 2024 to 2034, with about 1.1 million openings a year on average, while logisticians are projected to grow 17% over the same period. (bls.gov; bls.gov) Operations roles cover the machinery that keeps a business moving after the product ships: purchase orders, inventory, vendor setup, fulfillment, reporting, and the software records tying those pieces together. In practice, that often means one generalist is asked to stand up processes before a company is large enough to split them into finance, supply chain, and business systems teams. (onetonline.org; bls.gov) That mix shows up across startup hiring boards. Recent postings include a Director of Operations at apparel brand nuuds overseeing 3PL partners, inventory, and fulfillment, and a Head of Operations role at Eucalyptus described as “hands-on” and “execution-first.” (jobs.lever.co; job-boards.greenhouse.io) The specialist side is expanding too. Current remote listings on major job boards include thousands of operations roles, and procurement postings regularly ask for vendor onboarding, purchase order management, and ERP familiarity rather than a narrow industry pedigree. (indeed.com; simplyhired.com; roberthalf.com) ERP work is especially revealing because it is the bookkeeping layer for physical and financial operations. Companies use those systems to track what was ordered, what arrived, what was paid, and which supplier or team owns the next step. (roberthalf.com; simplyhired.com) The pay band in the cited specialist role also places operations work in the middle of the startup labor market: not executive compensation, but above basic administrative support and tied to systems experience. Comparable remote procurement and supply-chain listings on public job boards show hourly rates in the same range, including $30-an-hour junior procurement contracts work and $35.67 to $41.03-an-hour supply chain specialist roles. (x.com; simplyhired.com; dexian.com) For candidates, the pattern is straightforward: startups and boutiques are still hiring people who can make messy processes legible. The titles vary, but the work is the same basic promise — fewer bottlenecks, cleaner data, and a company that can keep growing without breaking. (x.com; x.com; bls.gov)