Job Details
Salary: Competitive
Hours: Full Time, 37.5 hours
Location: VHQ, Crawley, hybrid 3 days in the office
Contract: Secondment (12 months)
Closing Date: 3rd August 2025
At Virgin Atlantic Airways, we believe that everyone can take on the world, and it's our vision to become the most loved travel company. As we embark on this next exciting stage of our journey, we’re harnessing our spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation to challenge the status quo.
In a nutshell
As Airport Excellence Manager, you will lead and drive excellence across our ‘above wing’ airport operations. You’ll be comfortable designing and delivering high-quality, standout programmes that delight customers at each stage of their journey through the airport.
You’ll play a pivotal role in delivering high Net Promoter Scores (NPS) and supporting Virgin Atlantic’s dual ambitions of becoming the Most Loved and Sustainably Profitable airline. You will lead long-term improvement plans, create performance frameworks for consistency, and support impactful 'in-the-moment' changes to elevate the customer experience across the airport network.
Day to day
Some of your key responsibilities as an Airport Excellence Manager will be:
- Maintain and evolve the above-wing experience framework, ensuring excellence, innovation, and customer delight are embedded in every stage of the ground journey.
- Shape and evolve policies and processes to support consistent, high-quality delivery across the airport network.
- Deliver fast, meaningful change in line with our brand ambitions and long-term goals
- Act as the key link between strategy and operations, representing Airports in customer forums and ensuring initiatives translate into seamless, on-the-ground delivery.
- Represent airports at internal forums, ensuring operational perspectives contribute to strategic priorities.
- Collaborate effectively across teams to achieve results through others, ensuring alignment and accountability.
- Coach and guide teams across the airport network to drive continuous improvement and accountability. Translate data and reporting into meaningful insights that drive action and continuous improvement across airport operations.
About you
Are you a natural leader with a passion for creating exceptional customer experiences? Do you thrive in fast-paced environments where innovation, collaboration and operational excellence come together?
We’d also love for our successful Airports Excellence Manager to demonstrate the following:
- A strong passion for delivering exceptional customer experiences and driving operational excellence across every Airport touchpoint.
- Build strong stakeholder relationships, engaging and influencing across internal and external teams, including senior leaders.
- Excellent communication skills, with the ability to adapt style to connect effectively across teams and functions.
- Strong analytical capability, using data to inform decisions and drive meaningful change.
- Highly organised, with the ability to manage multiple priorities and deliver with focus, energy, and discipline.
- The ability to create compelling narratives that drive alignment and engagement
- A relentless focus on improvement and creating the best experience for our customers
Ideally, you will also have experience of working in an Airport or Customer environment and have a deep understanding of what delights customers in an airport setting.
If this sounds like you, we would love to hear from you!
Internal info
Hiring manager: Gail YatesGlobal grade: D
Our recipe for leadership
At Virgin Atlantic, our leaders empower teams to thrive through collaboration, innovation, and excellence. Explore our Leadership Recipe and discover the 20 core ingredients that define what it means to lead with us, driving our mission to be the most loved travel company and achieve sustainable profit. Want to learn more? Click here
Be yourself
Our customers come from all walks of life and so do our colleagues. That’s why we’re proud to be an equal opportunity employer and actively encourage applications from all backgrounds. At Virgin Atlantic, we believe everyone can take on the world - no matter your age, gender, gender identity, gender expression, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disabilities, religion, or beliefs. We celebrate difference and everything that makes our colleagues unique by upholding an inclusive environment in which we can all thrive. So that everyone at Virgin Atlantic can be themselves and know they belong.
To make your journey with us accessible and individual to you, we encourage you to let us know if you’d like a little extra help with your application, or if you have any individual requirements at any stage along your recruitment journey. We are here to support you, so please reach out to our team, ([email protected]) feeling confident that we’ve got your individual considerations covered.