Customer Experience Manager

Customer Experience Manager Salary: £35,000 to £40,000 (depending on experience) Location: Holly Farm Business Park, Warwickshire Hours: Full-time, office-based Contract: Permanent Direct reports: Customer Service Assistant(s) About Caterpillar Crafts Caterpillar Crafts is a growing creative business specialising in cross stitch, crochet and craft products. We have a passionate customer community across the UK, USA and beyond, and ambitious plans for the next stage of our growth. We're building a bigger, more structured business without losing the personal, community-focused experience our customers love. We're looking for someone who wants to help us build that. The role We're looking for an experienced Customer Experience Manager to lead our Customer Service team and help us build the next stage of our customer experience. This isn't simply a role managing an inbox. You'll lead the team, set standards, improve processes, analyse customer feedback, use data to identify what we should do better and manage customer and community events. We're growing quickly, so we need someone who naturally takes ownership. Someone who sees a problem, gets to the bottom of it, thinks through the options and comes back with a recommendation. You'll have real responsibility and the opportunity to make a visible difference to a growing creative business and the community of customers at its heart. What will I be doing? Lead the Customer Service teamLead, manage, coach and develop the Customer Service team, setting clear standards, objectives and KPIs. Plan workloads and resources, including busy periods, product launches and events. Monitor response times, resolution times, quality and consistency across email, social channels and telephone. Own the customer experience Act as the voice of the customer and own the end-to-end customer journey. Identify pain points, recurring issues and opportunities, investigating root causes rather than repeatedly treating symptoms. Measure whether changes have genuinely improved the customer experience. Use customer insight and data You will help us understand what our customers think, want and need, and turn that information into action. Develop and manage customer feedback programmes across key products and experiences. Identify trends, recurring issues and emerging customer needs and produce regular customer insight reports. Monitor relevant Customer Experience metrics including satisfaction, response and resolution times, complaints, refunds, reviews, repeat purchase, retention and customer lifetime value. Improve how we workDocument and maintain clear Customer Service processes and SOPs. Identify inefficient, repetitive or unnecessary work and improve systems, processes and procedures.Identify opportunities to automate or simplify work, including appropriate use of technology and AI. Customer retention and loyalty Identify opportunities to increase retention, repeat purchase and loyalty and understand potential causes of churn. Support the development and improvement of subscription and membership experiences. Customer issues, escalations and brand protection Take ownership of escalated customer complaints and complex issues. Protect the reputation of Caterpillar Crafts through excellent customer resolution. Manage copyright infringement cases Monitor and report copycat products or stores Digital customer experience Work with the relevant teams to improve the online customer journey. Ensure FAQs and customer-facing information remain accurate and clear. Identify customer journey issues across the website and other digital touchpoints. Events and community Provide customer insight to inform event planning. Plan and manage in-person events, virtual events and customer experiences, including Stitch Retreats and Virtual Stitching Socials. Caterpillar Cares Lead the development of Caterpillar Cares as a meaningful community and charitable initiative. Define the annual objectives and activity plan for Caterpillar Cares. Develop employee volunteering and fundraising opportunities and coordinate agreed initiatives. What we need from you We're looking for someone with: Proven experience in Customer Service, Customer Experience or a similar management role. Experience managing, coaching and developing people. Excellent written and verbal communication skills.Strong organisational skills and attention to detail. Strong problem-solving, analytical and process improvement skills, with experience using data to identify trends and opportunities. Commercial understanding of customer retention and lifetime value. Ability to manage competing priorities, give and receive direct constructive feedback, and work confidently across departments.Experience handling difficult customer situations. A proactive approach and a genuine sense of ownership. An interest in using technology and AI to work more efficiently. Experience with ecommerce, Shopify, Klaviyo or similar systems would be useful but isn't essential.How you work matters One of our company values is “Leave It With Me”. For this role, that means more than simply completing the task you've been given. When something lands with you, we expect you to take ownership of it. If you identify a problem, understand it, consider the options, make a recommendation and take responsibility for getting the solution implemented to quality and time. We also expect you to: Take ownership and see things through. Look for root causes rather than treating symptoms. Bring solutions as well as problems. Make decisions within your area of responsibility and use evidence and data to inform decisions. Challenge constructively and be comfortable being challenged yourself. Give honest, direct and respectful feedback. Manage your own priorities and workload. Balance customer needs with commercial reality. Look for ways to make things better and take responsibility for results, not just activities. This probably isn't for you if... You're looking for a quiet, predictable customer service role or prefer being told exactly what to do. You don't enjoy managing people or difficult conversations. You dislike KPIs, reporting or accountability. You become overwhelmed when priorities compete. You want to complete tasks without taking responsibility for the bigger picture. You're applying because you love cross stitch and imagine you'll spend your days talking about crafts. This is a professional management role in an ambitious, growing business. You will probably love this role if... You naturally take ownership and immediately start thinking about how to solve problems. You enjoy making decisions, working to clear targets and improving systems and processes. You enjoy analysing data, finding patterns and balancing customer needs with commercial reality. You enjoy developing people and getting the best out of a team. You're comfortable giving and receiving feedback. You want genuine responsibility and visible impact on a growing business. Decision-making Make decisions using your judgement. Identify problems early and consider the options. Recommend a course of action and take ownership of implementation. Escalate significant commercial, legal or reputational risks appropriately. What success looks like after 12 months Customer Service operates confidently with clear processes, standards and KPIs. The team is well managed, capable and accountable, with increasing independence and less day-to-day intervention from senior leadership. Customer enquiries are handled efficiently and consistently, with high customer satisfaction and fewer recurring issues. Customer feedback is systematically collected and turned into action. You can demonstrate measurable improvements to the customer journey, customer experience and supporting processes. Leadership receives useful insight and clear recommendations, and other departments actively seek your customer perspective. Customer Experience is recognised internally as a source of insight and improvement, not simply the department that answers emails. You have delivered meaningful improvements and built a strong team culture based on ownership, accountability and continuous improvement. Our recruitment process We want to get to know you beyond your CV, so our recruitment process is designed to show us how you think, communicate, solve problems and approach responsibility. Application Please submit your CV to Tim Wilson, Operations Director (tim@caterpillarcrossstitch.com) with a covering letter and answer the two questions below. Applications that don't complete this section won't progress to the next stage. 1. You've been given £1,000 to spend on making our customers' experience better. What would you do? 2. If you could add one new rule to the world that everyone had to follow for a day, what would it be and why? The opportunity We're ambitious. We're growing the business and the team, and the way we work will need to evolve with us. This role suits someone who wants responsibility, wants to improve things and wants to be part of building the next stage of Caterpillar Crafts. If you want a role where you can make a genuine difference, take ownership and see the results of your work, we'd love to hear from you.