Are you a passionate driver of change, eager to shape the future of retail by embedding a culture of continuous improvement. As the Country Continuous Improvement Leader, you'll be instrumental in advancing Lean methodologies across our operations, enhancing productivity, and delivering exceptional customer value in an evolving omnichannel landscape.

About this work area

IKEA Retail, as the core business of Ingka, is dedicated to creating a better everyday life for many by ensuring long-term profitable growth, making IKEA more affordable, accessible, and sustainable. This commitment involves leading retail operations, serving happy customers, and developing IKEA as a purpose-led brand, while continuously expanding our presence to meet customers wherever and however they choose. We proactively set the digital agenda, driving the rapid development and operation of digital products and services using new technologies and agile methods, thereby fostering the continuous growth of our technical, people, and business skills to enhance our digital capabilities.

As the Country Continuous Improvement Leader for IKEA Australia & New Zealand, you will be responsible for driving Lean methodology and ways of working across the organisation. Your role will be to enable a robust continuous improvement capability, aiming to enhance productivity, quality, and efficiency, reduce waste, and ultimately increase both co-worker engagement and customer value by implementing Lean principles across all units and processes. Your responsibilities will include but are not limited to:

• Identifying and prioritising key improvement areas with country business owners and management, aligning with the overall country roadmap and organisational goals. Support business owners and Business Navigation in calculating business potential and tracking progress, while enhancing lean ways of working cross-functionally.
• Driving and empowering the implementation of Lean ways of working across units and Service Office to boost productivity, quality, efficiency, reduce waste, and increase co-worker engagement and customer value.
• Supporting business owners in developing, implementing, and maintaining standardised processes across units to drive efficiency, quality, and continuous improvement.
• Inspiring co-workers to adopt a strong everyday waste elimination mindset, and train leaders and end-users in Lean principles, methods, and tools.
• Acting as the primary ambassador and go-to person for continuous improvement and Lean thinking across the country, coaching and challenging leaders and managers through change processes and in their daily operations.
• Contributing to the global development of the Lean ways of working initiative, framework, and concept by participating in the Lean network and sharing learnings and challenges with colleagues.

You bring deep knowledge of continuous improvement methodologies, particularly Lean, having actively applied its mindset, principles, methods, and tools within operations, backed by a solid retail business understanding and extensive experience. You also possess strong knowledge of how to create and implement change initiatives in complex environments & effectively manage stakeholders. You are an early adopter of technology, harnessing the power of AI in your practice. Furthermore, you excel at leading in uncertain environments, embracing a proactive, experimental, and solution-focused mindset, driving with high perseverance to deliver results and overcome obstacles. You are performance-driven, excel at building trustful relationships to lead through change, and apply end-to-end thinking and steer away from siloed approaches.

To be considered for this role you will have:

• Proven experience in applying continuous improvement methodologies in operations.
• Strong problem-solving skills, coupled with expertise in data analysis and fact-based decision-making.
• Experience leveraging AI and automation to speed up organisational processes will be highly regarded.
• Demonstrated training, facilitation, mentoring, and coaching skills.
• Experience within a global organisation, leading in a complex business environment that includes both physical and digital operations and development.

Additional information:

• Permanent, full-time, 76hrs/fortnight.
• The location for the role is Service Office, Tempe NSW, with a minimum of 3 days a week on-site.
• If you are successful for this role, you will be required to obtain a national police check.

We need people like you

At IKEA, work is so much more than a job. Come join us!