There was a time when mortgage broking was a cottage industry of part-time players and one-man bands. Times have changed, and the model brokerages of today are placing greater value on those with operational expertise.
All businesses experience growing pains. As mortgage brokerages grow, the first pressure point is almost always operational. Files pile up, turnaround times blow out, the business owner becomes the bottleneck, and suddenly the business becomes overwhelmed and unproductive. At this point, hopefully someone suggests hiring an operations manager. But hiring the wrong person, or hiring too early, can create more problems than it solves.
A high-performing operations manager isn’t just a part-time support staffer with a new title. As tempting as it can be to promote your intern, you need to appreciate that an ops manager is the backbone of a scalable brokerage: the person who builds structure, drives consistency, and frees the business owner to focus on revenue and relationships. When onboarded well and supported properly, an ops manager becomes the quiet engine behind sustainable growth.
However, many brokerages fall into the same traps when making this hire. Here are a few common ones we’ve seen..
Mistake 1: Hiring another broker instead of an ops specialist
This is an understandable mistake. At the end of the day, brokers know brokers. They trust brokers. And when the workload becomes overwhelming, bringing in someone who “gets it” feels like the safest option. The problem is that brokers and operations specialists are wired differently. A broker thrives on relationships, momentum, and dealmaking. An operations manager thrives on systems, structure, and optimisation. When you hire a broker to do an ops job, you often end up with someone who is capable but fundamentally misaligned with the role. They’ll gravitate toward client work rather than operational discipline. The bottlenecks remain in place and can even get worse.
Mistake 2: Hiring someone too junior
The title “operations manager” gets thrown around loosely in our industry. Many businesses hire someone with limited experience and expect them to build processes, manage compliance, implement technology, and lead a team. That’s not fair to the junior person you hire, and it’s not effective for your business.
A true operations manager is a strategic operator. They understand workflow design, capacity planning, reporting, and how to turn chaos into clarity. When you hire too junior, you end up managing them instead of them managing the business.
Mistake 3: Hiring before systems and processes exist
This is the most common and the most expensive mistake. An operations manager is not a magician. If the business has no documented processes, no consistent workflow, no clear expectations, and no operational rhythm, even the best ops manager will struggle.
Systems come first. People come second. Without that foundation, you’re setting your new hire up to fail.
As an ops specialist in the broking industry, I’ve witnessed these same mistakes play out time and time again. The truth is most brokerages don’t need a fulltime operations manager immediately. they need temporary operational leadership to stabilise the business and prepare it for the right longterm hire.
A core part of my work with brokers involves stepping in as your interim operations function. We build the systems, processes, and technology foundations that allow your business to run smoothly and predictably. We work with the business owner to clarify what the future operations role should look like, what skills it requires, and how it will integrate into the business.
By the time you’re ready to hire, you’re not guessing. You’re recruiting an ops manager into a well-designed structure with clear expectations and a proven operational rhythm. That’s how you avoid mishires and create a brokerage that can scale sustainably.
A great operations manager should elevate a brokerage. If you’re feeling the strain of growth, you may not need to hire immediately. You might just need the right operational support at the right stage.
