Head of Category Planning, Grocery Drinks - Fixed Term Contract

Salary: Competitive Plus Benefits

Location: Holborn Store Support Centre and Home, London, EC1N 2HT

Contract type: Fixed-Term Assignment

Business area: Food Commercial

Closing date: 27 March 2025

We’d all like amazing work to do, and real work-life balance. That’s waiting for you at Sainsbury’s. Here, everything in our stores starts out in Food Commercial. Whether it’s the product, proposition, packaging or price, or the fact that something tastes great, our team is responsible for all food items available in store, digitally and on demand. You’ll discover it’s incredibly fast-paced. People here are in it together and not afraid to take risks. They’re enthusiastic too, and their amazing leadership team is right behind them. The knowledge and experience you gain here could set you up for career moves, anywhere else in the business. So, if you’re passionate about food and just as hungry to learn, you’ll fit in perfectly.

The Head of Category Planning is a pivotal role within the category leadership team. You will be a proven leader, able to recruit, coach and develop a high-performing team. You will lead the team through long-term vision, short-term annual goals and tactical strategies. The role has line management responsibility and indirectly with influence across both category planning and ranging. You will work alongside Category Planners, Range Analysts, Buyers, supply chain, development and technical colleagues. It is both a multi-functional and a cross-functional leadership role. This role is a Fixed Term Contract and based out of our Holborn Store Support Centre. The successful candidate will be forward-thinking, insightful, with a commercial mind-set. You’ll have strong project management skills and a highly organised approach. Your first thought will always be the customer, and your can-do approach will help move things at pace, with a proven track record of both data-led decision-making and great intuition. Your central role to our plan means that you will need to have excellent influencing skills and a very adaptable style, to support making things happen for the category and for Grocery.

As a Head of Category Planning you’ll:

• Lead the category planning and ranging team to successfully implement the category and customer plan, delivering a market-leading performance
• Evolve and iterate the value strategy, our secondary space approach, our range and merchandising strategy and our promotional plan
• Ensure day-to-day excellence of all category activity landing in store
• Lead the category plan implementation process, ensuring resource for key projects and that project outcomes and PIRs are embedded in future thinking
• Proactively participate in strategic developments that impact the category by managing and/or leading elements of the category plan
• Lead the range agenda for the category through your team of Range Analysts and Category Planners, ensuring the calendar activity drives relevant ranges and meets the needs of our customers
• Through your team, plan and optimise our secondary space to maximise effectiveness and relevancy to our strategy
• Ensure relentless focus on activating our products, plans and sourcing credentials, both through events and day-to-day
• Work closely with other stakeholders (e.g. Retail, Commercial Operations, Marketing) to deliver category activities and drive the category plan through others
• Take ownership of key strategic workstreams at a BU level and through others, deliver the desired outcomes
• Develop and coach a high-performing team, underpinned by clear and measurable objectives and a succession plan

Your experience will include:

• Strong commercial business acumen in Fresh and/or Grocery Trading
• Experience in a commercial leadership role
• Experience in project management, ranging or category planning & strategy preferred
• Ability to develop short to long term strategic plans
• Experience of setting clear objectives for your team: lead, support and coach them in delivering these objectives, and to build strong relationships across other functions to create a single high-performing team
• Best in class communication skills – verbal and written – you must be able to make the complex simple
• Sound and confident judgement
• Ability to build strong relationships including engaging and influencing key stakeholders
• Genuine adaptability and ability to manage ambiguity
• Resilience in the face of pressure and setbacks, ability to bounce back and continue to motivate yourself and your team
• Supermarket specific retail knowledge desirable, but not essential

We are committed to being a truly inclusive retailer, so you’ll be welcomed whoever you are and wherever you work. Around here, there’s always the chance to try something new - whether that’s as part of an evolving team or somewhere else across the business - and we take development seriously and promise to support you. We also recognise and celebrate colleagues when they go the extra mile and, where possible, offer flexible working. When you join our team, we’ll also offer you an amazing range of benefits.

Here are some of them:

• Starting off with colleague discount, you’ll be able to get 10% off at Sainsbury's, Argos, TU and Habitat after 4 weeks. This increases to 15% off at Sainsbury’s every Friday and Saturday and 15% off at Argos every pay day.
• We’ve also got you covered for your future with our pensions scheme and life cover.
• You’ll also be able to share in our success as you may be eligible for a performance-related bonus of up to 65% of salary, depending on how we perform (in cash and shares).
• Your wellbeing is important to us too. You’ll receive an annual holiday allowance, and you can buy additional holiday.
• We also offer other benefits that will help your money go further such as season ticket loans, cycle to work scheme, health cash plans, pay advance (where you can access some of your pay before pay day) as well access to a great range of discounts from hundreds of other retailers.
• You’ll also receive a company car cash allowance unless you are going to travel 10,000 business miles in your role, then you’ll be able to choose a car.
• And if you ever need it there is also an employee assistance programme, you will also be eligible for private healthcare too.
• Moments that matter are as important to us as they are to you which is why we give up to 26 weeks’ pay for maternity or adoption leave and up to 4 weeks’ pay for paternity leave.