About Kendra Scott:
We are a fun, talented and driven team dedicated to providing our customers with gorgeous products and a WOW! experience. Family, fashion and philanthropy are at the core of our company and though we move at a very fast pace, we are committed to maintaining a family-oriented work environment and giving back to our community. A passion for great design, dedication to innovation and a strong social media presence are our building blocks for creating a unique and engaging lifestyle brand across all channels, including retail stores, wholesale accounts and e-commerce. Our headquarters are located in the heart of Austin, Texas, and we embrace the unique vibe and energy of our hometown as an inspiration for our brand and company culture.
Position Overview:
We have an exciting opportunity to help drive the efficiency and effectiveness of our product design processes at Kendra Scott! Reporting to our VP of Design, our Design Operations Director will optimize speed to market by guiding the Design team to adhere to timelines and implementing processes that will enable creativity and productivity.
Responsibilities:
Department Leadership
• Partner with our VP of Design to lead the management and strategy for timely and successful execution of the functions and end to end processes of the Product Design team.
• Lead and facilitate the operations and administrative functions of the Product Design team and partner with VP Design to ensure team alignment and integration with department timelines and cross functional product to market calendars.
• Lead process management, including managing workflow from inception to execution while maximizing the team's productivity and insuring the team is meeting all deadlines.
• Develop comprehensive understanding of existing design calendar, processes and external expectations of design. Understand departmental and cross functional dependencies.
• Identify and execute on opportunities for improvement in the design processes, cross functional partnerships/processes and overall product to market calendar as it relates to design.
• Partner with VP of Design and leadership team to develop, track and report weekly/monthly/quarterly metrics, deadlines and adherence to expectations and objectives.
• Foster the culture of creativity, entrepreneurship, calculated risk-taking, innovation while demonstrating an understanding of cross functional dependencies.
• Partner with Design leadership team to hire, motivate and develop an effective team.
Cross Functional Leadership
• Develop comprehensive understanding of existing product to market calendar, business processes and the impact of and to Design Operations and processes.
• Attend weekly Calendar meeting with cross functional senior leadership to capture information and proactively communicate changes or new initiatives that will impact the Design team and/or cross functional teams.
• Partner with the cross functional partners to anticipate future needs and challenges and proactively develop and implement new process improvements initiatives to enable efficiency in design operations.
• Lead cross functional process management with a focus on the inception of design to the workflow between design, sourcing and merchandising.
• Proactively identify solutions that will contribute to organizational success and make recommendations
• Partner with Design VP on design budget responsibility
• Ensure department spending is in line with budget
• Partner with Finance team to review actuals versus budget
• Representative Design at key cross functional operations and strategy
Our Ideal Candidate Will Have:
• A Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience
• 7+ years’ experience in a consumer product design role, preferably in the area of fashion
• 3+ years’ experience leading and managing a team and/or cross functional teams, preferably in a consumer product design group
• Ability to define departmental objectives & strategy that align with the business goals
• Thorough understanding of product design and related operations, processes and administration
• A growth mindset: a track record of leveraging past learnings, encouraging new ideas and smart risk taking in self and others
• Strong communication skills with a proven ability to build cross functional partnerships to make effective decisions
• High commitment to employee growth and development
• A shared appreciation for our 3 core values of Family, Fashion and Philanthropy