Location: Santa Clara, California
Employment Type: Full-Time, Exempt
Schedule: Monday–Friday, fully on-site
Reports To: Board of Directors, through the Board President
Direct Reports: Operations and administrative staff
Starting Salary Range: $120,000–$140,000 annually, depending on qualifications and experience
About Ameen Housing Cooperative
Ameen Housing Cooperative of California (AHC) is a mission-driven cooperative housing organization structured as a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) and operated as a member-run cooperative. AHC provides Riba-free homeownership opportunities to the Muslim community.
AHC is seeking an experienced Operations Manager to lead day-to-day operations, manage staff, strengthen financial and operational controls, oversee real-estate activities, and build efficient systems to support sustainable growth.
Position Overview & Strategic Objective
The Operations Manager is AHC's senior day-to-day operational leader, responsible for ensuring the organization operates efficiently, accurately, and professionally across its financial, real-estate, member-service, compliance, and administrative functions.
The successful candidate will be a hands-on operator and people leader who takes ownership, establishes accountability, solves problems, and builds reliable processes.
Above all, the Operations Manager should keep AHC's larger mission in focus: to make Riba-free homeownership accessible to Muslims across the United States while delivering compelling, consistent, and sustainable returns to investors.
The Operations Manager executes Board-approved policies and strategy; the Board of Directors retains governance, fiduciary, policy, and strategic authority.
Key Responsibilities
1. Operations & Team Leadership
- Lead AHC's day-to-day operations and ensure timely execution of organizational priorities.
- Supervise operational and administrative staff and establish clear roles, priorities, and accountability.
- Monitor performance and address personnel or operational issues promptly and professionally.
- Establish appropriate cross-training and redundancy for critical functions to ensure continuity of operations and minimize reliance on any single employee.
- Coordinate staff recruiting, onboarding, training, and development in partnership with the Board.
2. Financial Operations, Accounting & Compliance
- Oversee financial operations and ensure accurate, complete, and timely accounting records are maintained.
- Ensure all required tax filings, regulatory filings, and financial reporting are completed accurately and on time.
- Maintain AHC in a state of continuous audit readiness, with books, records, reconciliations, supporting documentation, and financial controls maintained throughout the year.
- Oversee banking and treasury activities, including deposits, ACH transactions, wires, and other fund movements.
- Monitor financial controls, identify discrepancies or risks, and ensure timely resolution.
- Coordinate with accounting personnel, auditors, tax professionals, and other external advisors.
- Ensure financial information provided to the Board is accurate, complete, and timely.
3. Real Estate & Home Transactions
- Oversee AHC home purchases, sales, refinances, closings, and other real-estate transactions.
- Ensure transaction documentation, financial calculations, and approvals are accurate and complete.
- Coordinate with escrow officers, title companies, real-estate agents, attorneys, contractors, and other service providers.
- Monitor transactions from initiation through closing and ensure issues are resolved promptly.
- Oversee operational activities associated with AHC's housing assets.
4. Member Services
- Ensure members receive timely, professional, and respectful service.
- Establish effective systems for tracking and resolving member requests and issues.
- Monitor service levels and identify recurring issues requiring process improvement.
- Ensure appropriate escalation of complex or sensitive matters.
5. Systems, Processes & Continuous Improvement
- Develop and maintain SOPs for critical AHC processes.
- Identify operational bottlenecks, control weaknesses, inefficiencies, and unnecessary complexity.
- Standardize workflows and improve the use of CRM, accounting, reporting, and collaboration systems.
- Establish meaningful operational metrics and dashboards.
- Use technology and AI where appropriate to improve efficiency and organizational capacity.
6. Cost Management
- Identify and implement opportunities to reduce operating costs without compromising service, compliance, or quality.
- Review vendors, recurring expenses, workflows, and resource utilization for efficiency.
- Track cost-saving initiatives and report results to the Board.
- Promote responsible stewardship of AHC resources.
7. Board Support
- Provide the Board with accurate, complete, and timely operational and financial information.
- Prepare reports, dashboards, meeting materials, and other information required for effective Board oversight.
- Support execution of Board-approved strategic and operational initiatives.
- Coordinate AHC's Annual General Board Meeting (AGBM) and Quarterly General Member Meeting (QGMB) by ensuring required information, reports, presentations, materials, and logistics are prepared and provided to the Board on time.
- Coordinate staff and external parties to ensure meeting-related activities and follow-ups are completed smoothly.
- Promptly escalate material operational, financial, compliance, or personnel issues to the Board President.
First-Year Success Measures
Within the first year, the successful candidate will be expected to:
- Establish clear accountability and appropriate operational coverage across the team.
- Ensure critical processes are documented and supported by appropriate cross-training.
- Maintain accurate accounting records and continuous audit readiness.
- Ensure tax and regulatory filings are completed accurately and on time.
- Strengthen financial and operational controls.
- Improve member-service response and resolution times.
- Improve execution and visibility of real-estate transactions.
- Establish meaningful operational reporting and dashboards.
- Reduce unnecessary operating costs.
- Eliminate or materially reduce single-person dependencies.
- Establish consistent, professional, and accountable operating practices.
- Successfully support AGBM and QGMB activities.
Qualifications
Qualifications
Required
- Minimum 8 years of progressive experience in operations management, organizational leadership, financial operations, real-estate operations, or a comparable senior operational role.
- Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Finance, Accounting, Operations, or a related field.
- Demonstrated experience managing and supervising employees.
- Strong understanding of financial operations, controls, accounting processes, and business operations.
- Experience managing multiple operational functions simultaneously.
- Strong analytical, organizational, and problem-solving skills.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Demonstrated ability to take ownership and drive execution.
- Strong proficiency with spreadsheets, business systems, and digital collaboration tools.
- Ability to work effectively with Board of Directors within defined governance boundaries.
- Commitment to AHC's mission and values.
- Legally authorized to work in the United States.
Preferred
- Master's degree or MBA.
- Experience in real estate operations, including residential transactions, escrow, property or asset management.
- Experience with REITs, housing cooperatives, financial services, or investment organizations.
- Experience with banking, treasury, accounting, audit, or compliance.
- Experience working with volunteer Boards, investors, or community-based organizations.
- Familiarity with Islamic finance principles.
- Experience implementing SOPs, dashboards, workflow systems, or process-improvement initiatives.
Employment Terms
- 90-day introductory period with performance reviews at 60 and 90 days.
- Employment is at will, subject to applicable laws.
- Employment is contingent upon successful completion of a background check, consistent with applicable California laws.
- Annual performance reviews thereafter, conducted by the Board President in coordination with the Board.
Work Environment
- Mission-driven organization with meaningful community impact.
- Small-team environment with significant operational responsibility and visibility.
- Direct engagement with organizational leadership and the Board.
- Opportunity to build durable systems and processes with long-term organizational impact.
To Apply
Interested candidates should submit:
- Resume.
- Cover letter explaining their interest in AHC's mission and qualifications for the role.
- LinkedIn profile, if available.
- Professional references may be requested from finalists.
Applications should be submitted to:
[email protected]
Pay: $120,000.00 - $140,000.00 per year
Work Location: In person
