Head of Retail Operations

**Job no**: 996767
**Work type**: Full-Time
**Location**: Melbourne - CBD & Inner
**Categories**: Retail Operations

**_Country Road Group (CRG) is embarking on transformation to position itself for growth, leveraging our scale, capabilities and culture as a House of Brands. We are investing in new and existing capabilities and have a number of exciting opportunities available._**

The Head of Retail Operations will lead the centralised retail operations strategy across all Country Road Group brands, ensuring that every store is positioned to deliver profitable operations and exceptional customer service. The goal of this role is to drive high standards of operational efficiency and capability, spearheading strategic initiatives and leveraging the efforts and scale of multiple brands to deliver excellent store operations through strong tools, operational processes, and coordinated best-practices.

**Key Accountabilities**
- Leadership & Team Management:_
- Develop and implement retail operations standards and strategies to ensure consistency and excellence across all store locations
- Guide and support the team in executing their responsibilities effectively and aligning with overall brand goals
- Lead the Retail Operations function for all brands' retail businesses, overseeing a team of retail operations experts.
- Strategic Planning & Execution:_
- Lead the development and execution of strategic retail projects (e.g., in-store technological upgrades or transformation initiatives), partnering on change management approach with Heads of Retail to enhance operational efficiency and deliver exceptional customer and team member experience
- Coordinate with stakeholders to align retail strategies and calendar of planned initiatives with brand vision and ensure successful implementation across all stores.
- Workforce Planning & Optimisation:_
- Lead the creation of workforce plans (leveraging wage budgets and forecasts provided through partnership with Finance team), ensuring optimised staffing levels to meet operational demands and enhance store performance in cost-efficient way
- Oversee Dayforce tool usage for in-store rostering, ensuring compliance with key legislation such as GRIA/NES, etc. and driving store-team upskilling approach. Partner with IT team to continuously update and develop tool capabilities, providing insight on objectives and needs of brand retail teams
- Partner with People & Payroll teams to minimise potential breaches, workshop process improvements, and ensure ongoing coordination between rostering and accurate payroll execution.
- Operational Efficiency & Analytics:_
- Manage store analytics, data and insights, and reporting functions to track performance, identify trends, and drive continuous improvement
- Partner with IT team to identify and develop new reporting capabilities needed to enable retail performance and insights approach
- Implement and monitor operational processes to ensure efficiency and consistency in store operations, overseeing strategic deep-dives into key processes and partnering with Heads of Retail to incorporate brand-specific considerations.
- Visual Merchandising & Store Execution:_
- Coordinate visual merchandising (VM) production needs across brands, aggregating requests to provide coordinated tender approach to shared vendors and hold accountable to quality, cost, and timing needed by brand teams
- Collaborate with the Head of Visual Merchandising to ensure that VM guidelines and fixtures are consistently implemented and maintained
- Oversee scheduling, delivery and installation of VM collateral in stores to ensure alignment with brand strategies and drive cost-efficient and effective execution across all locations.
- People & Leadership:_
- Provide leadership across Retail Operations team, promoting vision and motivation for the brand; ensuring clear paths of communications and information flow are developed and executed
- Embrace uncertainty and change while facilitating and enabling strategic change with clarity, empathy and optimism
- Collaborate across group, building team cohesion and connection, to inspire and bring our House of Brands strategy to life
- Create & foster an inclusive environment where all team members can thrive and feel included, respected and safe. Set clear expectations of behaviour and hold self and others accountable
- Partner with people business partner to ensure the current and future people needs and opportunities are delivered to support the strategic plan i.e. team culture, training and capability, talent capability.

**Key Capabilities**
- Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Retail Management, or a related field
- Relevant certifications in retail management, project management, or financial management (e.g., PMP, CPA) are advantageous
- Extensive Management experience within a retail environment or working in a high sales turnover retail business
- Extensive Operations experience, working on operational proces