Director, Digital Operations - The Orchard

About The OrchardThe Orchard is a leading full-service music distribution company operating in 48 markets worldwide and servicing top global independent artists and labels. With cutting-edge operations and an unparalleled global team, The Orchard partners with clients to provide full scale solutions across a variety of verticals. Championed by an exceptional community of music lovers and experts, The Orchard empowers creators to grow and evolve in the dynamic, global industry. The Orchard focuses on providing a comfortable, social, and engaging environment to encourage productivity and creativity.This position reports to VP, Digital Operations based in NYCThe Director, Digital Operations is responsible for leading and optimizing The Orchard’s global digital supply chain, with a focus on accuracy, compliance, and operational excellence across UGC and fingerprinting services. This role oversees the systems, processes, and standards that ensure sound recordings and metadata are delivered correctly, efficiently, and in alignment with partner requirements and client expectations. Acting as a central operational authority, the Director develops SOPs, authors critical documentation, manages backlog prioritization, and resolves high-impact delivery or ingestion issues.In addition to overseeing day-to-day supply chain performance, the Director serves as the operational lead for catalog migration initiatives of any scale—defining best practices, establishing cross-functional workflows, and ensuring successful execution across global teams. This role requires deep technical understanding of digital delivery specifications, rights identification, and partner ingestion behavior, combined with the leadership skills to guide internal teams, drive process improvements, and collaborate with product, engineering, and business stakeholders.What You'll DoOffice- first role, in office 4 days a week.UGC and Fingerprinting Supply ChainEstablish and maintain standard operating procedures (SOPs) for monitoring The Orchard’s ERN SRR feeds to UGC and fingerprinting partnersEnsure sound recordings are delivered accurately and consistently to UGC and fingerprinting services, maintaining high data integrity and partner complianceOversee and resolve encoding, delivery, and ingestion errors across all ERN SRR feeds, coordinating with engineering, product, and partner operations teams as neededMonitor ERN SRR delivery and ingestion timelines to ensure partner SLAs are met and internal standards for responsiveness are achievedManage and prioritize the supply chain backlog, ensuring timely processing of deliveries, updates, and takedowns based on business impact and partner requirementsAuthor internal documentation for troubleshooting complex delivery pipelines, including guidance on confirming identifiers (ISRC, UPC, proprietary IDs) and determining rights ownership across territoriesCreate documentation to support manual execution of supply chain actions (e.g., queuing deliveries, triggering updates, issuing takedowns), ensuring clarity for both regional and global teamsLiaise with UGC and fingerprinting partners on delivery specs, ingestion behavior, support escalations, and metadata requirementsEstablish and manage a standardized process for onboarding new UGC partners to The Orchard’s ERN SRR feeds, including requirements gathering, delivery configuration, and validation workflowsCatalog Migration LeadershipDevelop migration frameworks that account for varying catalog types (e.g., M&A, new client catalog, expansion of rights for existing clients) and differing technical or metadata complexitiesLead cross-functional alignment by collaborating with internal teams (Operations, Rights Management, Product & Engineering, Relationship Management, Solutions) to ensure roles and responsibilities, and all operational requirements and downstream impacts are understood and accounted forServe as the escalation point for high‑priority issues that arise during migration execution, providing guidance, troubleshooting, and decision-making supportAnalyze migration outcomes and compile post‑mortems to identify root causes of issues, formalize lessons learned, and drive continuous improvementBuild documentation and repeatable workflows that scale globally and can be used to train teams across regionsEnsure migration processes uphold compliance with partner delivery specifications and internal data governance standardsCreate and enforce quality assurance standards for pre‑migration validation, in‑migration monitoring, and post‑migration reconciliation to ensure metadata accuracy, rights correctness, and partner complianceDSP Operations & Feed EnhancementsProvide strategic direction and operational guidance to team members responsible for DSP request fulfillment, and feed maintenance, ensuring their work aligns with broader Digital Operations priorities and organizational goalsReview and validate new workflow designs and process changes, ensuring they meet best‑in‑class operational standards and integrate effectively with global Digital Operations practicesPartner closely with the DSP Operations lead to establish consistent intake of requests, prioritization, and fulfillment standards, ensuring alignment with SLA expectationsProvide oversight and strategic input on feed enhancement initiatives, helping define prioritization criteria, QA standards, and validation approaches for rolloutServe as the escalation point for complex DSP operational issues, feed‑related errors, or workflow conflicts, guiding resolution and mitigating downstream impactWho You AreA proven leader in managing cross-functional projects in the digital music spaceResults-oriented, committed to continuous improvement and operational excellenceAn articulate communicator, both verbally and in writing, with the ability to convey complex information clearly and concisely to diverse stakeholdersKnowledgeable about various commercial models and usage types in digital music, with a keen understanding of the unique supply chain challenges they presentAn interested, proactive problem solver and naturally organized multitasker, with a keen instinct for prioritizing tasks effectivelyAn independent self-starter who takes initiative and knows when to seek guidance or ask questions to ensure successYou HaveExpertise with ERN, SRR, DDEX specificationsExperience with UGC and fingerprinting ecosystems (YouTube CMS, Meta, TikTok, Audible Magic, Pex, etc.)Experience collaborating with international partners and teams, fostering strong relationships across culturesExperience with SFTP and S3 clients, Command Prompt programs (including iTunes Transporter), Looker, and SQLA solid understanding of audio and video encoding formatsPrior experience in supply chain operations, rights management, or within the broader music industry is highly preferredWhat We Give YouYou join an inclusive, collaborative and global community where you have the opportunity to channel your passion every day A modern office environment designed to foster productivity, creativity, and teamwork empowering you to bring your best Opportunities to connect with our valuable resources, such as our Counsel of Equity & Progressive Action (CEPA), a group created by our employees tasked with developing and implementing innovative solutions to advance a globally-shared goal of ensuring fair and inclusive spaces for allAn attractive and comprehensive benefits package including medical, dental, vision, life & disability coverage, and 401K + employer matching Voluntary benefits like company-paid identity theft protection and resources for pets, mental health and meditation resources, industry-leading fertility coverage, fully paid leave for childbirth or bonding, fully paid leave for caregivers, programs for loved ones with developmental disabilities and neurodiversity, subsidized back-up child and elder care, and reimbursement for adoption, surrogacy, tuition, and student loans Investment in your professional growth and development enabling you to thrive in our vibrant community. The space to accelerate progress, positively disrupt, and create what happens next Time off for a winter recess The Orchard is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all persons regardless of age, disability, national origin, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, veteran or military status, marital and civil partnership/union status, alienage or citizenship status, creed, genetic information or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.The anticipated annual base salary does not include any other compensation components or other benefits that an individual may be eligible for. The actual base salary offered depends on a variety of factors, which may include as applicable, the qualifications of the individual applicant for the position, years of relevant experience, specific and unique skills, level of education attained, certifications or other professional licenses held, and the location in which the applicant lives and/or from which they will be performing the job.New York Pay Range$120,000—$125,000 USD