Your Impact
The Director, Category Management and Planning, leads a team of Merchandise Assortment Planners and Planogram Analysts, who are responsible for delivering assortment plans and planograms for merchant initiatives, end-to-end product line reviews and business reviews for their assigned businesses. The Director leads a team who provides their Merchant partners a clear omnichannel view of the market and target opportunities that will drive category growth and inform the category strategy. They utilize market gap analysis, competitive research and internal Lowe's guidelines and standards to support design of visually compelling presentations aimed at maximizing ease and experience for store associates and customers and maximize assortment and shelf space productivity. As the direct point of contact for the GMM, the Director works closely with the GMM to develop the category strategies and the assortment and space tactics required to deliver the defined strategy and category growth. The Director is accountable for proactively managing their resources, ensuring appropriate balance between driving execution excellence (e.g. on time and accurate plans) and delivering the expected assortment and space productivity goals for the business. In addition, they are responsible for collaborating cross-functionally with internal resources across US and India (people, technology, and project budgets) as well as external partners to establish work plans that are aligned with project objectives and development timelines. As the leader of the team, the Director is accountable for the one time and accurate delivery of all plans and planograms. The Director is also responsibilities also include training, development, mentoring, and performance management of their category management and planning team members. Through a coordinated effort with key stakeholders across business and technology the Director, Category Management and Planning, ensures Merchandising vision and category strategies are effectively implemented in stores and online.

• Use an in depth understanding of the merchandising decision process to lead the Assortment Planners, as they guide omnichannel merchants through the decision-making process that leads to high productive assortments and planograms that improve ease of shopping and maximize space productivity.
• Leverage macro-economic trends, customer and product research, competitive intelligence, and supplier insights to strengthen category recommendations and drive category growth and inform category strategies.
• Drive application and adoption of the best-in-class Category Management solutions, analytics and tools used to create and present actionable insights and recommendations to their Merchant partners. Fundamental category responsibilities include customer, product, and competitive data expertise, assortment and shelf management, and cross functional partnerships with internal and external stakeholders.
• Lead the Assortment team in translating a complex set of business rules, role and intent of the category, shopper insights and store clustering into assortment planning decisions including:
  • Oversee the creation and configuration the Clustered Assortment Plan
  • Collaborate with Product Information team to validate item data and attributes (customer decision tree, cost, packaging, etc) used to drive analytics and insights are accurate and complete
  • Oversee the development of assortment and space insights and the presentation of assortment recommendations to their Merchandising partners
  • Ensures enterprise portfolio objectives are being achieved in Role of the Category, Localization, Pro Growth, Private Brands and Assortment/Space Productivity
  • Lead the Assortment team to analyze and identify assortment planning opportunities to review with their merchant teams (e.g. assortment shop, drop and keeps)
• Champion the team's collaboration with Divisional Merchandising Managers, Sr. Merchants, and Merchants to interpret assortment analysis and identify recommendations for current items and to develop assortment plans for new items.
• Lead Planogram team through micro space design, analytics, planning, and execution. Outputs include:
  • Store planograms that indicate where and how to place merchandise on the sales floor for best visual, operational, and financial advantage. Work requires collaboration with internal cross-functional teams such as visual space planning, fixture design and project planning and external vendor partners, to ensure output is aligned with strategic objectives and execution timelines.
• Divisional lead of PLR/BR process, oversee and manages the execution of all aspects of the end-to-end assortment planning process including planning and execution of product line review activities
• Provides leadership, mentoring individuals with optimal Assortment Planning & Category Management best practices to ensure team is delivering on all aspects of the product line review goals.
• Collaborate and communicate relevant information with various business areas across Lowe's (e.g., Visual Space Planning, Inventory Planning and Logistics) to ensure Merchandising's vision and strategies are implemented effectively.
• Partner with Merchandising Execution Project Management team to drive operational reporting on the status and activities related to merchandising initiatives, PLR and BR.
• Partner with Product, DACI, and Engineering teams to ensure stability of existing technology and development of new tools that support analytical decisions and efficient execution.
• Identify, recommend, and champion ways to improve business processes, enhance system solutions and reduce costs by leveraging understanding of the business and relevant interdependencies.
• Lead annual capacity planning and resource modeling conversations using historical data and forward-looking strategic plans. During the year, help all capability areas across the department balance workload and resources in response to shifting business priorities.
• Hire, train and develop a team of leaders and experts that utilize persistent application of data and insights to drive category growth. Coach associates to achieve personal and professional goals and aspirations.
• Communicate with multiple levels of Sr. Leadership on projects and initiatives. Seek feedback from leaders across omni merchandising, field merchandising and store operations to drive continuous improvement.

• Bachelor's Degree Business, Retail Management, Finance or related field and 10 Years of Relevant Work Experience