Account Operations Supervisor - Shift C at Crane Solutions in Houston, TX

Job description

• Fri-Sun 18:00-07:00
• The Account Operations Supervisor, Ground leads the Operational Account Coordinator team and owns the quality of demand entering the ground network.
• Where the Operations Supervisor owns execution once a booking exists, this role owns everything upstream of it: the completeness and accuracy of what customers requests, the consolidation decision made before a new booking is built, and the standard of communication going back to the account.
• The Supervisor is the leadership voice to the customer when a coordinator cannot resolve an issue alone, and the point at which a customer escalation is converted into a clear internal request with the facts already assembled.
• The role also carries the account-level performance picture — intake defect rates, exception aging, escalation volume, and the recurring gaps that need a tooling or process fix rather than another manual workaround.
• The Supervisor is measured on intake quality, consolidation capture, customer confidence, and the capability and coverage of the coordinator team.

Responsibilities

• Intake Quality & Booking Governance
• Own the quality of demand entering the process — every booking released to execution should be complete, accurate, and require no rework.
• Audit bookings for completeness at first release and hold coordinators to the standard on asset detail, references, addresses, service level, and required dates.
• Hold the team to the booking creation target of 15 minutes once a customer request is complete, without trading accuracy for speed.
• Verify that orders built in the customer platform reconcile to what the customer actually requested before a booking is created in TMF.
• Measure and drive down the rework rate returned by Outbound Specialists, treating each instance as an intake defect with a cause rather than a one-off correction.
• Ensure that where no system pre-alert exists, the originating request and all bills of lading travel with the shipment so downstream teams are never working from partial context.
• Consolidation Governance
• Own the consolidation decision tree and ensure it is applied to every new request before a booking is created — this is the cheapest point in the process to prevent duplicate freight.
• Arbitrate marginal or contested consolidation calls, and make the decision rather than leaving it unresolved on the board.
• Coordinate with the Operations Supervisor and Capacity Manager when a consolidation changes committed capacity, appointments, or documentation already in flight.
• Track missed consolidation opportunities as a measured defect, root-cause them, and adjust the decision tree or training accordingly.
• Customer Relationship & Communication Standards
• Set and enforce the account communication standard — response times, tone, level of detail, and who is authorized to commit a date or service outcome.
• Ensure commitments to the customer are made only by the assigned coordinator or by the Supervisor, so the account never receives two different answers.
• Act as the escalation point for the customer when a coordinator cannot resolve an issue or when the situation calls for a leadership voice.
• Own the cadence of proactive notification on at-risk shipments, so the customer hears about a problem from Crane before they discover it themselves.
• Prepare and present operational performance in account reviews, including honest treatment of misses and specific corrective actions rather than reassurance.
• Coach the team on written communication quality — a coordinator’s email is the account’s primary experience of the operation.
• Escalation & Exception Ownership
• Monitor the operational boards at account level for aging exceptions and intervene before they become service failures or customer escalations.
• Convert customer escalations into clear internal requests — stating what happened, the impact, and the decision required — rather than forwarding pressure into the operation.
• Route escalations to the correct owner: execution and shift issues to the Operations Supervisor, capacity and carrier failures to the Capacity Manager, systemic and tooling gaps to the Program Manager.
• Escalate security concerns involving cargo integrity, chain of custody, or program compliance to the GSOC Security Team and management immediately.
• Hold account-facing documentation to a clear standard: separate verified fact from inference, judgment, and allegation, particularly when a customer claim is in dispute.
• Follow escalations to closure and confirm the outcome is reflected in the systems and communicated back to the account.
• Coverage, People Leadership & Development
• Maintain a coverage model in which every account has a named primary coordinator and a named backup — no account dependent on one person’s availability.
• Onboard new coordinators and certify competency on the TMF booking tool, the customer order platform, the Aljex boards, and Open Dock before they own an account independently.
• Cross-train coordinators across accounts to remove single points of failure and to make absence and holiday coverage routine.
• Coach and develop the team through regular one-to-ones, with specific feedback tied to real files rather than general encouragement.
• Manage performance directly and fairly — set clear expectations, recognize strong judgment, and address shortfalls early and in writing.
• Build a team culture of directness and kindness, where a coordinator raises a problem early without fear and communication stays crisp under pressure.
• Account Performance & Continuous Improvement
• Report account-level performance — intake quality, on-time pickup, exception aging, escalation volume and repeat rate, and contribution to mean time to invoice — with cause behind the variance.
• Use Power BI and system reporting to identify patterns the board does not show, including recurring request defects from a specific customer site.
• Partner with the Program Manager on tooling and integration improvements, including booking tool gaps, asset visibility in the customer platform, and manual workarounds that have become permanent.
• Convert recurring exceptions into updated SOPs, decision trees, templates, and checklists so improvements survive turnover.
• Work with the customer to improve the quality of inbound requests where the root cause sits on their side of the process.

Requirements

• Experience leading account coordination for a strategic, high-value, or security-sensitive customer program.
• Experience preparing and presenting operational business reviews to a customer.
• Experience authoring SOPs, decision trees, and training material that a team actually uses.
• Working knowledge of Power BI or comparable tools for building and interpreting operational dashboards.
• Exposure to continuous improvement methods and comfort running root-cause analysis on recurring request defects.
• Understanding of cross-border documentation requirements and specialized handling.
• Associate’s or bachelor’s degree in logistics, supply chain, business, or a related field; equivalent operational experience considered.
• 5–7 years of experience in freight or 3PL account management, customer operations, or transportation operations, including at least 1–3 years leading or supervising a team.
• Demonstrated ownership of a customer relationship through a service failure — able to hold the relationship without over-promising to relieve pressure.
• Excellent written communication, and the ability to raise the writing standard of a team.
• Hands-on experience with transportation management systems; familiarity with e2open TMF and Descartes Aljex preferred.
• Working knowledge of US domestic ground freight modes (FTL, LTL, intermodal) and the shipment lifecycle from booking through invoice.
• Sound judgment on what to decide, what to delegate, and what to escalate, and the discipline to assemble facts before escalating.
• Data literacy sufficient to build an account performance narrative and defend it in a customer review.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office (Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint) and Microsoft Teams.
• Education
• Required
• High School or better.

Skills

Required

• Excellent written communication
• Sound judgment
• Directness and kindness
• Comfort running root-cause analysis
• Power BI
• Microsoft Teams
• Transportation management systems (TMS)
• e2open TMF
• Descartes Aljex
• Open Dock

Benefits

• At Crane, we believe in providing our employees with excellent benefits at a Great Place to Work.
• Quarterly Incentive Plan
• 136 hours of Paid Time Off which equals 17 days for the year, that can be used for Sick Time or for Personal Use
• Excellent Medical, Dental and Vision benefits
• Tuition Reimbursement for education related to your job
• Employee Referral Bonuses
• Employee Recognition and Rewards Program
• Paid Volunteer Time to support a cause that is close to your heart and contributes to our communities
• Employee Discounts
• Wellness Incentives that can go up to $100 per year for completing challenges, in addition to a discount on contribution rates
• Come join the leader in logistics and take your career in the right direction.