City Head – Business Development & Operations

City Head
Student Living | Zolo
Own the city. Grow the business. Deliver the experience.
Why this role exists
Student Living is not just about operating residences.
Each city is a business that needs to consistently acquire students, maintain strong occupancy, deliver a reliable living experience, control costs, and build relationships that enable long-term growth.
As the business scales, success in each city depends on having one leader who sees the complete picture and takes accountability for the overall outcome.
The City Head exists to own the city as a business.
This means bringing together:
Revenue and occupancy
Student acquisition and sales
Property operations
Customer experience
Cost and profitability
Team performance
Institutional and local relationships
New property ramp-up and city growth
If this role is strong, the city grows profitably, properties remain occupied, students have a strong experience, teams execute consistently, and new opportunities are identified early.
If this role is weak, functions operate in silos, occupancy suffers, costs increase, customer issues escalate, and growth becomes difficult to sustain.
Your mandate is clear
Own the complete P&L for the city
Deliver revenue, occupancy, and profitability targets
Drive student acquisition and business growth
Ensure properties operate consistently and efficiently
Own the end-to-end student experience
Build and lead strong city teams
Develop institutional and local partnerships
Identify and execute new growth opportunities
Build a city business that can scale sustainably
This is not a functional role.
It is end-to-end ownership of the city business.
About Zolo and Student Living
Finding dependable accommodation has historically been fragmented and inconsistent.
Students and parents often have to choose between location, affordability, safety, quality, convenience, and community.
People settled for compromises because the system offered few trustworthy options.
Zolo reimagined living and hospitality as a connected journey.
Zolo Coliving simplifies urban living and student living creates safe, structured environments where students can focus and grow.
Z Hotels serves the modern traveler with consistency, warmth, and operational discipline.
Today, over 100,000 people trust Zolo across different phases of life.
Our ambition is to build the most trusted living and hospitality ecosystem for the new generation by partnering deeply with property owners who think long term.
Our Student Living business brings together accommodation, operations, service, community, and technology to create environments where students can live comfortably while focusing on their education and growth.
What you will be responsible for
Own the City P&L
Take complete accountability for city revenue, costs, margins, and profitability
Build and deliver against annual, quarterly, and monthly business plans
Understand the key drivers of city-level financial performance
Identify revenue gaps and cost leakages early
Take corrective actions to ensure achievement of P&L targets
Make business decisions balancing growth, customer experience, and profitability
Drive Revenue & Occupancy
Own occupancy and revenue targets across Student Living properties in the city
Build strong visibility into demand, inventory, pricing, and conversion
Work closely with sales and marketing teams to drive student acquisition
Identify underperforming properties and create recovery plans
Drive renewals and retention wherever relevant
Ensure available inventory is monetized effectively
Build the City's Growth Engine
Understand the student housing market, demand pockets, colleges, universities, and competitive landscape
Identify opportunities to grow the Student Living business within the city
Build relationships with colleges, universities, educational institutions, and other relevant partners
Identify new demand channels and partnerships
Support evaluation and ramp-up of new properties
Build a strong local network that enables future growth
Own the Student Experience
Ensure students receive a consistent and reliable living experience across properties
Track customer feedback, complaints, service issues, and experience metrics
Ensure critical issues are resolved with urgency
Identify recurring problems and drive permanent solutions
Build strong service standards across properties
Balance student expectations with practical and sustainable business decisions
Drive Operational Excellence
Ensure properties consistently meet defined operating standards
Maintain visibility across housekeeping, maintenance, security, food/service delivery, and other critical operations
Review property-level performance and intervene where execution is weak
Ensure operational issues do not remain unresolved or repeatedly escalate
Build systems and review mechanisms that improve execution discipline
Ensure new properties stabilize quickly after launch
Lead & Build the City Team
Lead city-level sales, operations, customer experience, and other relevant teams
Set clear targets and ownership across functions
Build strong second-line leaders and property-level teams
Review performance consistently and address gaps quickly
Create accountability without becoming the bottleneck for every decision
Build a high-performance culture focused on outcomes
Use Data to Run the Business
Maintain strong visibility into city and property-level performance
Track revenue, occupancy, conversion, costs, customer metrics, and operational performance
Identify trends and risks before they become larger problems
Conduct structured business reviews with teams
Use data to prioritize interventions and allocate resources
Ensure decisions are based on business outcomes rather than assumptions
Manage Stakeholders & Partnerships
Work closely with central Sales, Marketing, Finance, HR, Product, Procurement, and Operations teams
Build strong relationships with institutional partners and other external stakeholders
Align different teams toward common city-level outcomes
Resolve cross-functional blockers that affect business performance
Represent the Student Living business effectively within the city
What success looks like after 6–12 months
City revenue and profitability are on or ahead of plan
Strong and sustainable occupancy across properties
Clear improvement plans exist for underperforming assets
Student acquisition channels are diversified and predictable
Customer experience and service metrics remain consistently strong
Operational escalations and recurring issues reduce
City teams operate with clear accountability and ownership
Strong relationships are established with relevant colleges, universities, and local partners
New properties and growth initiatives are ramped up effectively
Leadership has clear visibility and confidence in the city's performance
The city begins to operate as a predictable, profitable, and scalable business unit.
Who this role is for
You will likely thrive here if:
You naturally think like a business owner, not a functional manager
You are comfortable owning a P&L and being accountable for the final number
You can move between strategy and on-ground execution
You understand that revenue, operations, and customer experience cannot be managed in isolation
You enjoy building businesses and solving ambiguous problems
You are comfortable taking difficult calls when business outcomes require them
You can influence teams and stakeholders even when they do not directly report to you
You use numbers to understand problems but are equally comfortable getting on the ground to solve them
You have the energy to operate in a fast-moving, execution-heavy environment
You take ownership when something goes wrong instead of looking for which function is responsible
Experience we value
Experience owning a city, region, cluster, category, or business unit
Demonstrated exposure to P&L / revenue / profitability ownership
Strong experience across business operations, growth, sales, or general management
Experience managing multiple properties, locations, branches, centres, or distributed operations is valuable
Strong people leadership and cross-functional management experience
Experience in Student Housing, Education, Hospitality, Co-living, PropTech, Hotels, Managed Accommodation, Consumer Services, or other multi-location businesses is preferred
Exposure to instituti

Work arrangement
No