Director, Digital Operations - The Orchard

About The Orchard The 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 NYC The 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 do:  Office- first role, in office 4 days a week. UGC and Fingerprinting Supply Chain Establish and maintain standard operating procedures (SOPs) for monitoring The Orchard’s ERN SRR feeds to UGC and fingerprinting partners Ensure sound recordings are delivered accurately and consistently to UGC and fingerprinting services, maintaining high data integrity and partner compliance Oversee and resolve encoding, delivery, and ingestion errors across all ERN SRR feeds, coordinating with engineering, product, and partner operations teams as needed Monitor ERN SRR delivery and ingestion timelines to ensure partner SLAs are met and internal standards for responsiveness are achieved Manage and prioritize the supply chain backlog, ensuring timely processing of deliveries, updates, and takedowns based on business impact and partner requirements Author internal documentation for troubleshooting complex delivery pipelines, including guidance on confirming identifiers (ISRC, UPC, proprietary IDs) and determining rights ownership across territories Create documentation to support manual execution of supply chain actions (e.g., queuing deliveries, triggering updates, issuing takedowns), ensuring clarity for both regional and global teams Liaise with UGC and fingerprinting partners on delivery specs, ingestion behavior, support escalations, and metadata requirements Establish and manage a standardized process for onboarding new UGC partners to The Orchard’s ERN SRR feeds, including requirements gathering, delivery configuration, and validation workflows Catalog Migration Leadership Develop 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 complexities Lead 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 for Serve as the escalation point for high‑priority issues that arise during migration execution, providing guidance, troubleshooting, and decision-making support Analyze migration outcomes and compile post‑mortems to identify root causes of issues, formalize lessons learned, and drive continuous improvement Build documentation and repeatable workflows that scale globally and can be used to train teams across regions Ensure migration processes uphold compliance with partner delivery specifications and internal data governance standards Create and enforce quality assurance standards for pre‑migration validation, in‑migration monitoring, and post‑migration reconciliation to ensure metadata accuracy, rights correctness, and partner compliance DSP Operations & Feed Enhancements Provide 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 goals Review and validate new workflow designs and process changes, ensuring they meet best‑in‑class operational standards and integrate effectively with global Digital Operations practices Partner closely with the DSP Operations lead to establish consistent intake of requests, prioritization, and fulfillment standards, ensuring alignment with SLA expectations Provide oversight and strategic input on feed enhancement initiatives, helping define prioritization criteria, QA standards, and validation approaches for rollout Serve as the escalation point for complex DSP operational issues, feed‑related errors, or workflow conflicts, guiding resolution and mitigating downstream impact Who you are: A proven leader in managing cross-functional projects in the digital music space Results-oriented, committed to continuous improvement and operational excellence An articulate communicator, both verbally and in writing, with the ability to convey complex information clearly and concisely to diverse stakeholders Knowledgeable about various commercial models and usage types in digital music, with a keen understanding of the unique supply chain challenges they present An interested, proactive problem solver and naturally organized multitasker, with a keen instinct for prioritizing tasks effectively An independent self-starter who takes initiative and knows when to seek guidance or ask questions to ensure success You have:  Expertise with ERN, SRR, DDEX specifications Experience with UGC and fingerprinting ecosystems (YouTube CMS, Meta, TikTok, Audible Magic, Pex, etc.) Experience collaborating with international partners and teams, fostering strong relationships across cultures Experience with SFTP and S3 clients, Command Prompt programs (including iTunes Transporter), Looker, and SQL A solid understanding of audio and video encoding formats Prior experience in supply chain operations, rights management, or within the broader music industry is highly preferred What We Give You: You 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 all An 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 Offices: United States, New York (New York);