Trainline

About us:

We are champions of rail, inspired to build a greener, more sustainable future of travel. Trainline enables millions of travellers to find and book the best value tickets across carriers, fares, and journey options through our highly rated mobile app, website, and B2B partner channels.

Great journeys start with Trainline ????

Now Europe’s number 1 downloaded rail app, with over 125 million monthly visits and £5.9 billion in annual ticket sales, we collaborate with 270+ rail and coach companies in over 40 countries. We want to create a world where travel is as simple, seamless, and affordable as it should be.

Today, we're a FTSE 250 company driven by our incredible team of over 1,000 Trainliners from 50+ nationalities, based across London, Paris, Barcelona, Milan, Edinburgh and Madrid. With our focus on growth in the UK and Europe, now is the perfect time to join us on this high-speed journey.

We’re looking for an experienced Senior Research Operations Program Manager to lead critical improvements in our research tooling and operations ecosystem. This is a high-impact, contract role focused on evaluating, optimising, and managing our research tools and associated processes. You’ll work cross-functionally with UX and market Researchers, Product & Commercial stakeholders, Procurement & Legal to ensure our tools are fit-for-purpose, cost-efficient, and support research at scale.

As the first Senior Research Operations Program Manager in the Product Research team, you’ll have unique opportunity to shape and elevate research operations more holistically - bringing vision, infrastructure and strategic enablement for the research team as a whole.

This role is ideal for someone who can quickly understand complex systems, drive change independently, and bring structure and clarity in ambiguous environments.

For this role we would be open to this being either on a full time basis or 4 days a week.

As the Senior Research Operations Program Manager at Trainline, you will...????

• Audit and assess the current research tooling ecosystem to increase efficiency, impact and leverage technological developments in AI
• Identify tooling gaps and opportunities, look for and evaluate alternatives, make actionable recommendations, coordinate trials or demos, evaluate success
• Oversee vendor management, including procurement processes, contract & pricing negotiations, renewals, compliance, onboarding, access management
• Drive smooth rollouts/trials of new tools through clear communication, stakeholder engagement and change management
• Manage tool transitions - lead the sunsetting of legacy platforms, outline legacy plans and oversee effective transitions to new platforms
• Collaborate cross-functionally with UX and market Researchers, Product, Design, Commercial, Procurement & Legal to determine needs & use cases, ensure tools meet research and organisational needs, governance and privacy standards
• Increase the value of existing tools, driving awareness, adoption, usage and integration
• Improve operational efficiency by setting up scalable processes, developing, evolving and socialising documentation, best practices and playbooks, access management
• Contribute to the broader Research Ops strategy, helping to shape workflows, infrastructure, and long-term enablement initiatives that support high-quality research at scale
• Drive initiatives independently, clearly communicating decisions, milestones and impact along the way

We'd love to hear from you if you have...????

• Extensive previous experience in program management, ideally in fast-moving or complex organisations
• Experience in operational roles supporting product, design or research teams (preferred)
• Proven success managing tooling ecosystems – evaluation, selection, negotiation, onboarding, sunsetting, lifecycle management, renewals
• Strong project management skills with a track record of leading cross-functional initiatives across stakeholders
• Track record of bringing improvements to workflows, documentation, operations driving higher value and efficiency
• Experience collaborating with procurement, privacy & legal teams on vendor agreements and compliance
• Experience with negotiating costs for higher value and cost optimisation
• A structured, outcomes-oriented approach with excellent organisational skills
• Highly proactive, self-driven and comfortable operating with autonomy and accountability
• Strong change management and stakeholder alignment abilities—you know how to influence, drive action, and bring people with you
• A systems-thinking mindset, with a deep understanding of organisational dynamics and how to make processes work at scale
• Exceptional communication skills—able to engage and influence across levels and functions, both technical and non-technical audiences
• Interest in AI developments and how to leverage them productively to enhance productivity & operational efficiency

Preferred:

• Experience in Research Operations or supporting UX / Research teams
• Strong familiarity with research tooling landscape, methods and workflows (e.g., customer feedback, unmoderated testing, recruitment)
• Understanding of privacy and compliance regulations (e.g., GDPR) as they relate to research tools and participant data

More information:

Enjoy fantastic perks like private healthcare & dental insurance, a generous work from abroad policy, 2-for-1 share purchase plans, extra festive time off, and excellent family-friendly benefits.

We prioritise career growth with clear career paths, transparent pay bands, personal learning budgets, and regular learning days. Jump on board and supercharge your career from day one!

Our values represent the things that matter most to us and what we live and breathe everyday, in everything we do:

• ???? Think Big - We're building the future of rail
• ✔️ Own It - We focus on every customer, partner and journey
• ???? Travel Together - We're one team
• ♻️ Do Good - We make a positive impact

We know that having a diverse team makes us better and helps us succeed. And we mean all forms of diversity - gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, nationality and diversity of thought. That's why we're committed to creating inclusive places to work, where everyone belongs and differences are valued and celebrated.

Interested in finding out more about what it's like to work at Trainline? Why not check us out on LinkedIn, Instagram and Glassdoor!