Operations Internship Q2 2022

Finding a home can be more stressful than divorce. And with the rise of hybrid work, figuring out where to live – at the right location, at the right time and at the right budget – has become more important than ever.

Our team is working to transform the property market: using AI, empathy, and data to make it 10x easier to find and secure the perfect place. We’ve already built and validated the UK’s first personalised property match-making engine. We are now extending this engine into a vertically integrated super-app that digitises the property transaction process end-to-end. We believe that property is about lifestyle needs, location, timing, and relationships. We also believe that we can make all of these elements stronger with technology.

Since launch, we’ve helped thousands of people. Our partners include some of the UK’s largest estate agents and institutional landlords, who have enjoyed 5x better conversions through our platform versus traditional portals. Backed by some of Europe’s greatest investors including Founders Factory and IFG.VC, we have grown at our fastest rate ever in the last 12 months. We’re now ramping up to expand across the UK and beyond, led by a diverse team of entrepreneurs and technologists with backgrounds from Red Bull Racing, BCG, Eigen Technologies and Intu.

What you’ll be doing

Our ops team is the backbone of the business, connecting customers to agents and ensuring that they find a home to live in, and have a brilliant experience with their property search. As an operations intern, you will proactively address customer concerns and needs, ensuring that they feel listened to, heard, and understood. You should expect to spend at least 75% of your time on operations with your core objective being to drive rental and sales deals (making calls to agents, connecting with customers), so attention to detail and good phone manners are a must.

Another 25% of your time will be allocated flexibly, based on your personal interests and the development needs of the operations function. You’ll work with your sponsor to develop an operations-related (doesn’t have to be pure ops) business critical project that we will actually use as a company.

Previous operations team members have used this time to contribute to operations strategy, design and run A/B experiments around user engagement and operations processes, take part in hackathons, develop their SQL and analytical skills by creating operations reporting dashboards, write playbooks on customer services, designing policies etc.

Structure

Our standard internship format is 3 months with an option to extend to 6.

This Internship Is Structured Into Three Phases

• Weeks 1 and 2: here you’ll get to know the company, the team and all of our quirks and working habits. The majority of your time will be spent doing day-to-day operations work.
• Weeks 3 to 6: here you’ll start picking up operations-related side projects that interest you. You’ll have an executive sponsor to ensure that these projects are actually meaningful to the company. Some interns will spend several weeks in this phase, trying their hand at many things. Others will decide quite quickly what they’re passionate about. You’ll still have operations work as normal (~75%).
• Weeks 6 to 12: here is where you’ll shift your focus to a business critical project that we co-design with you. You’ll still have operations work as normal (~75%), but your side projects will become fewer as you double down on your area of interest. You’ll own this project end-to-end (with support from the team) and report back to the business with the results.

You’re welcome to discuss the specifics of this process in your interview with us.

What you’ll get

We will embed you into our operations team, weekly meetings and monthly strategy meetings. That means you will have an inside view of the scaling journey we are on, and the challenges we face as a business. You’ll also have weekly meetings with your sponsor.

You’ll be able to work in a forward thinking environment that encourages the learning and personal development of the individual and will be able to contribute to the operations strategy in the team.

You’ll also get access to the SearchSmartly corporate wellness policy, which will give you a monthly allowance of £20 towards a wellness activity of your interest: whether that’s a manicure, swimming pool session, football session, gym class, yoga class, mindfulness app etc.

You’ll be paid national minimum wage for 32 hours per week. We can be flexible in how this time is allocated, although Monday to Wednesday are our busiest days. Please be prepared to discuss your schedule and availability during the interview.

What you should expect

This role represents a fixed, 3-month contract starting March 21st 2022 with an opportunity to extend to 6 if there is a mutual fit.

Our goal is to provide you with an opportunity to build your core skills, grow as an employee and get you ready for the next step in your career.

Who this would suit

This role will best suit someone that is motivated by the happiness of our users, and by closing deals. Ideally, you bring a strong customer success background to our team. Experience of renting or owning in the UK property market would be very beneficial.

You’ll also be someone who is keen to develop their analytical, partnership and customer service skills – and you’ll be keen to develop a career in property, startups, or technology.

Who can apply

Anyone, at home or abroad. Our team works wholly remote, so we are happy to accept international applications as long as you can work our core UK hours, a strong internet connection, and the necessary permits in place.

Application process

The application process is structured into three parts.

• A quick 15-minute phone call to discuss your general availability, prior commitments and career objectives. The goal is to establish whether this position is a practical fit for you.
• A small take home test which we would like you to complete within 48h.
• A final round interview where we debrief your test and learn more about your practical experience. The interview will also include a live exercise on the day.

Timings: we will look to close applications for this position on March 15th (note: we may close it 2-3 days early if the volume of applicants is very high). We’ll aim to run final round interviews w/c March 14th, with a view of making an offer towards the end of that week. We would target March 21st as the start date.

You are

• Available to work for 32 hours a week in the foreseeable future.
• Someone who is (or has been) involved in the UK property market – either as a tenant, owner or landlord.
• Someone with prior experience in customer service, sales, and/or attending to stakeholders. We’d like to see evidence of your people and customer service skills in your application, though we’re flexible on how you choose to highlight this.
• Organised – you stay on top of the details, record-keeping and making sure that everyone is on the same page as you are. The latter is especially important when you’re combining part-time work with external commitments.
• Proactive – you pay attention to other people and make an effort to anticipate their needs. You don’t leave things to the last minute.
• Emotionally Intelligent – you’ve got empathy for other people’s feelings and have a good grip on your own. You know when to step back and breathe.
• Disciplined and driven – you are good at making tough commitments and sticking to these over a protracted period of time. You enjoy meeting and exceeding your goals. You can evidence this in your application.
• Curious – we are a young, fast-paced organisation and constantly learning. To get the best out of your time with us, you need to be as excited by the unknown as we are!

Bonus Points

• Experience in the property sector and/or property management and hospitality.
• Experience working with the public at a call centre or customer services helpdesk
• Evidence of strong written and verbal communication skills, e.g. blogs or vlogs.
• Evidence of entrepreneurial drive and/or side-projects with an entrepreneurial flavour.
• Demonstrable interest in property, real estate, start-ups or tech as evidenced on your CV.
• Demonstrable interest in data. You enjoy working with data and have a lot of strong opinions, loosely held. You’d like to work in an environment where you can make an educated guess, “e.g. if we do X then our customers will do Y”, run a structured experiment based on that guess, and then see the results. You pay attention to details.