Operating Director, Customer Success

Location:
New York, NY (in-office, Midtown) | Portfolio-wide scope across North America, UK & EU

Reports to:
Sr. Operating Partner, Bloom Equity Partners

Travel:
Up to 40% across portfolio company HQs and customer sites

Status:
1099 Contractor

Salary Band:
$140,000-$180,000 + Bonus and DOE

About Bloom Equity Partners

Bloom Equity Partners is a lower-middle-market private equity firm focused on carve-outs, founder transitions, and value-creation investments in software, data, and tech-enabled services. We partner with management teams to transform good businesses into category-defining ones — combining operating rigor, a proven playbook, and hands-on support across revenue, product, and people.

Our portfolio is customer-outcome obsessed. We believe that in modern software, the best source of growth is the customer you already have — and that retention, expansion, and advocacy are the truest measures of product-market fit and operational excellence.

The Role

Bloom is hiring an Operating Director, Customer Success to own post-sale value creation across the portfolio. This is a hands-on, portfolio-wide operating role — you will parachute into companies, diagnose the customer engine, and drive measurable improvement in Gross Revenue Retention (GRR), Net Revenue Retention (NRR), and customer experience (NPS/CSAT).

You are the firm's senior-most voice on customer success, experience, and expansion. You will partner directly with portfolio company management teams, systems, talent, and playbooks that turn customers into compounding engines of growth. This is a role for an operator — not an advisor — who has repeatedly built and scaled world-class Customer Success and Customer Experience functions in B2B SaaS and is ready to apply that pattern-recognition across our portfolio.

You will sit on the Bloom operating team in New York, report to the Sr. Operating Partner. The mandate is narrow and deep: retain more, expand more, and make every portfolio customer a reference.

Key Responsibilities

Portfolio Retention & Expansion (GRR / NRR Ownership)

• Own GRR and NRR as firm-level KPIs. Set targets for every portfolio company at investment, track monthly, and drive the operating cadence that closes the gap between actual and target.
• Diligence the customer base during underwriting — cohort retention, logo concentration, churn drivers, expansion headroom, and NPS — and translate findings into the 100-day value-creation plan.
• Stand up a Bloom-standard retention forecasting discipline: renewal pipeline hygiene, churn risk scoring, save-play motion, and executive escalation paths. Target: >90% forecast accuracy on renewals inside 90 days.
• Lead quarterly retention reviews with each portfolio company CEO and CRO; present to the Bloom Investment Committee on portfolio-wide retention health.

Cross-Sell & Upsell

• Design and install the expansion motion in each portfolio company: land-and-expand playbooks, account tiering, whitespace mapping, and CS-sourced pipeline discipline.
• Build the commercial architecture for expansion — pricing and packaging, usage-based levers, multi-year uplift terms, and co-sell plays between CS and Sales.
• Set and hold portfolio companies accountable to CS-sourced pipeline (SAO) and expansion bookings as a % of ARR (target: 15–25% depending on stage).
• Drive NRR to >115% on platform investments and >110% on bolt-ons; eliminate preventable downsell through renewal segmentation and proactive value delivery.

Customer Experience & Voice of the Customer

• Raise the bar on customer experience across every touchpoint — onboarding, adoption, support, renewal, and advocacy. Benchmark NPS and CSAT portfolio-wide and publish the scorecard.
• Install modern CX instrumentation: journey mapping, product-usage health scoring, digital-led customer success for the long tail, and AI-assisted CSM workflows.
• Build the Voice of the Customer operating system — structured listening, closed-loop feedback, and monthly business reviews — and ensure signal flows back into product, GTM, and the boardroom.
• Champion executive sponsorship programs, reference programs, and customer advisory boards that turn satisfied customers into pipeline and product conviction.

Customer Success Operating Model

• Define the Bloom-standard CS operating model: segmentation (enterprise / commercial / digital), CSM ratios, comp plans, success plans, QBR cadence, and health-scoring framework.
• Build and certify the playbook library — onboarding, adoption, escalation, executive business review, renewal, expansion, and save — and coach portfolio CCOs on execution.
• Drive tooling and data maturity: CS platform (Gainsight / Catalyst / Planhat), CRM hygiene, usage telemetry, and real-time dashboards that expose health and trigger action.
• Lead the AI-in-CS agenda — deploy agentic workflows, predictive churn models, and automated success motions that let CSMs scale coverage without adding heads.

Talent & Leadership

• Serve as the executive talent architect for post-sale across the portfolio — recruit, assess, and upgrade CCOs, VPs of CS, VPs of Support, and Heads of CX.
• Act as coach and mentor to portfolio CS leaders; run a quarterly Bloom CS Leaders forum to exchange playbooks, benchmarks, and talent.
• Partner with Bloom's Talent team on compensation design, equity ladders, and succession planning for post-sale leadership.
• Represent the customer voice at portfolio boards — influencing product roadmap, pricing, and go-to-market strategy through the lens of customer outcomes.

Cross-Functional Partnership

• Partner with Bloom's Operating Partners across Talent, Sales, Marketing and Product to ensure a joined-up value-creation plan in every company.
• Collaborate with the Deal Team on diligence, 100-day planning, and add-on integration — particularly customer-base rationalization and cross-sell across acquisitions.
• Be the firm's external face on customer success — speak at industry forums, build a referral network of CS executives, and bring best-in-class practices back into the portfolio.

Target KPIs (Portfolio-Wide)

• GRR >92% (platform), >90% (bolt-on)
• NRR >115% (platform), >110% (bolt-on)
• CS-sourced Expansion SAOs as % of total pipeline: >25%
• Expansion Bookings Growth: >20% YoY
• NPS >45 and CSAT >4.3 across portfolio
• Renewal forecast accuracy >90% (90-day window)
• Time-to-first-value reduction of >30% within 12 months of engagement

Ideal Candidate

You are a proven post-sale operator who has built customer engines that retain, expand, and compound. You have done it more than once, in more than one company, and you are known in the industry for it.

• 10+ years in B2B SaaS or tech enabled services, including at least one tour as CS Functional leader in a >$10M ARR software or tech enabled services business.
• Demonstrable track record of moving NRR from <100% to >115% and holding GRR above 92% through a full cycle.
• Deep expertise in modern customer success — segmentation, digital CS, health scoring, AI-assisted workflows, and expansion commercial design.
• Strong customer experience instincts — NPS/CSAT programs, journey orchestration, voice-of-customer systems, and executive sponsorship.
• Experience operating under private equity ownership (sponsor-backed C-suite, board reporting, value-creation plans) is strongly preferred.
• Comfortable with carve-outs, M&A integration, and high-velocity operational change across multiple companies simultaneously.
• Based in or willing to relocate to the New York metro area; in-office presence in Midtown expected 4+ days per week when not traveling to portfolio companies.
• Executive presence with credibility to coach sitting CEOs, partner with deal partners, and represent Bloom to LPs and the broader market.

Why Join Bloom

This is not an advisory seat. You will have a real mandate, real capital behind you, and real companies to operate on. Bloom is one of the most active sponsors in the lower-middle market for software and tech-enabled services — and we are doubling down on customer-led growth as our defining value-creation thesis.

You will join a lean, senior operating team that values judgment over process, outcomes over activity, and direct partnership with founders and CEOs. You will have the platform to build something rare: a firm-level customer success practice that compounds across a portfolio and raises the bar for the asset class.

Bloom Equity Partners is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applications from candidates of every background and are committed to building a team that reflects the diversity of the businesses we back.