Head of Workforce Management & Data Analytics

TWG is a retained executive search firm representing a large retailer. They are seeking a Head of Workforce Management & Data Analytics.

This role serves as the senior leader responsible for enterprise Workforce Management and Workforce Analytics, owning labor standards, forecasting, staffing models, scheduling effectiveness, and workforce optimization across retail stores and distribution centers. This role will leverage advanced data analytics and modeling to ensure labor deployment aligns with operational demand, improves productivity, and enhances the overall team member experience.

The ideal candidate combines deep workforce management expertise with strong analytical and data‑driven leadership, bringing the ability to translate complex insights into practical, scalable solutions that work in a fast‑paced retail environment or equivalent industry experience where there is a large, dispersed workforce.

• Develop and maintain enterprise labor standards through strategic labor modeling, ensuring staffing approaches support operational needs across retail stores and distribution centers.
• Utilize forecasting and demand planning to create long‑range, budget, and short‑range labor forecasts that align staffing levels with business demand.
• Serve as the functional owner of the workforce management software suite (e.g., UKG, DOMO, Zebra), ensuring systems are configured to optimize scheduling compliance and budget adherence.
• Lead and develop a team of analysts responsible for transforming raw data into actionable insights, including identifying labor leakage, turnover correlations, and the return on labor investments tied to sales conversion.
• Partner cross‑functionally with Finance on labor budgeting, Human Resources on retention strategies, and Store Operations to ensure labor models are practical, scalable, and sustainable in a fast‑paced retail environment.
• Through ongoing model validation, refine labor standards for high‑touch services to ensure they accurately reflect current operational realities.
• Establish and execute a data analytics roadmap focused on reducing unproductive labor hours and improving overall workforce efficiency.

Required

• High school diploma or equivalent
• 10+ years of experience in workforce management
• 5+ years of experience in a senior leadership role.
• Deep expertise in labor modeling, scheduling algorithms, and time and attendance compliance.
• Strong proficiency in business intelligence tools such as Tableau and Power BI, with a foundational understanding of SQL or Python.
• Strong interpersonal, written, and verbal communication skills.
• Self‑motivated and highly collaborative, with strong attention to detail and the ability to maintain a high level of confidentiality and accuracy.
• Ability to coordinate and oversee the efforts of multiple support teams.
• Excellent customer service, organizational, and time management skills.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint).
• Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Data Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• Multilingual writing and language skills.