Design & Planning Standards Manager

About the role

The critical purpose of the role is to manage the creation and maintenance of generic retail and BOH layouts, store planning principles and design standards for all branches and formats. As the Design and Planning Standards Manager, you ensure all designs are optimised through the quality of the in-store customer experience created and the commercial results achieved. The successful candidate will manage a prioritised programme to support the transition of new design standards from concept through to core delivery ensuring cost clarity and that the correct levels of approval and stakeholder engagement and feedback are undertaken.

Develop and maintain an effective process to manage and communicate changes to standards as well as collaborating with key stakeholders and third parties in the delivery of great store environments through the ongoing optimisation of design, planning, space utilisation and cost efficiency. You'll ensure that site specific store plans and store designs are compliant with planning principles and design standards. Together with stakeholders in other directorates, you will also play a critical role in ensuring the continued application and achievement of the design standards the Store Development team establishes, ensuring the aesthetics of the customer experience do not diminish over time.

The Design and Planning Standards Manager role impacts the performance and customer experience of every store invested in through ensuring the consistent interpretation of the store design and planning principles. They also significantly influence the identification of improvements to design and planning principles through their objective review of a range of design and planning projects. The role manages the transition of new design standards from concept to core which requires managing a wide range of stakeholders including third parties who influence and impact the development and delivery of design and planning standards. It is essential that the person in this role works collaboratively across store development to facilitate the delivery of accurate and timely design and planning principles that support the Waitrose Investment programme. Experience gained through the delivery of the role should also be used to enhance existing design principles.

Salary: £46,600.00 - 69,800 per annum

Contract type: This is a permanent opportunity

Hours and location of the role: 35 hours per week. Your home location will be our Bracknell Head Office. The Partnership has adopted a hybrid working approach meaning you'll be able to work a mixture between the office and home based upon your personal needs whilst balancing the needs of the business. The team attend the office once or twice a week on average to connect and attend key meetings on more of an ad-hoc basis.

Key responsibilities:

• Lead the translation of the customer proposition, operational requirements, space requirements, new concepts/formats into generic layouts and design principles ensuring the appropriate level of sign off is achieved for any changes.
• Responsible for ensuring that the Design and Planning principles and all associated documentation is up to date with all changes being clearly communicated to key stakeholders.
• Work cross functionally with key stakeholders across Customer, Retail, Health and Safety, Property and Maintenance to review, influence and sign off store plans and new and existing design standards ensuring design changes are fit for purpose, cost effective, have been through a thorough due diligence process to minimise corporate risk, are sustainable (in line with corporate targets), and meet our customer and partner expectations.
• Support the concept to core process regularly liaising with Space Planning and other cross functional stakeholders/teams to ensure individual change projects are clearly communicated, with timescales, impacts assessments and costs to ensure there is a consistent understanding of when new design and planning standards will become effective.
• Responsible for the management of external consultants to ensure high quality, cost effective service is provided to Waitrose in the execution of all services related to the development of store planning & design principles.
• Demonstrate and foster commercial awareness, including competitor monitoring and assessment.
• Develop, manage and continuously improve processes associated with the delivery of the role.

Essential skills and/or experience you'll need:

• Experience in retail design development and practical application of design implementation on site.
• Store Planning or Store Implementation experience.
• Ability to read store plans and architectural drawings.
• Food retail experience.

Desirable skills and/or experience you may have:

• BA(Hons) Degree in 3D design or similar.
• Experience in managing design and planning standards and communicating change.
• A good understanding of Waitrose brand.
• Experience of working with, and managing, 3rd Party resource (e.g. architects and signage contractors).
• Working experience of AutoCAD, In-design, Sketch Up, Photoshop or similar.
• Project Management Experience.

Important points to note: It's important to note that some of our roles are subject to pre-employment vetting (which may include DBS checks for successful candidates). If required, you'll be informed and provided with information about vetting during the recruitment process and we encourage you to complete any vetting documents quickly to avoid delays. Any DBS checks required will be carried out by a third-party registered body and financial probity checks may also be required for some of our roles. We also recommend that you apply as soon as possible as vacancies can close early if we see a high number of applicants. We want all of our Partners to have a good work-life balance and we support flexible working. This might mean flexible or compressed hours, job sharing or shorter hour contracts, where possible. Please discuss this further with the hiring manager during your interview.