Area Manager

The Aje Collective; Sydney; On-site; AUD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

The Aje Collective seeks an Area Manager to lead boutiques across Chatswood, Kotara, Castle Towers and Parramatta. You will drive sales, coach store teams, maintain VM standards and ensure exceptional customer experiences.

Reporting to the Regional Manager, you will recruit, train, and develop staff while delivering strong financial results and brand integrity across your region. This role requires high energy, strategic planning, and a passion for luxury fashion.

Qualifications

• Proven experience leading retail teams in a multi-store environment.
• Strong customer service focus with KPI achievement.
• Ability to train and coach staff effectively.
• Experience with visual merchandising standards and stock management.

Responsibilities

• Lead and inspire boutique teams across multiple stores to exceed sales goals and KPIs.
• Develop exceptional customer service through positive relationships and high operating standards.
• Recruit, onboard, train, and develop staff; manage performance and succession planning.

Skills

Team Leadership

Customer Service

Store Operations

Visual Merchandising

Training & Development

Job description

The Aje Area Manager leads and inspires the team across Chatswood, Kotara, Castle Towers & Parramatta boutiques to exceed store sales goals and KPIS. Reporting to the Regional Manager, you will develop exceptional customer service through creating positive working relationships and maintaining high operational and visual merchandising standards. In addition to providing regular training and creating engaging tools to help your team succeed.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

LEADERSHIP

• Responsible for the development of each team member, ensuring they are able to fulfil their duties to the highest standard with minimal supervision
• Be a true ambassador by leading by example to deliver a high level of customer care unique to Aje
• Fostering a feedback rich culture by identifying opportunities for team members to improve their performance through positive and constructive feedback
• Ensure that that the action plans for performance reviews are managed in line with start dates and probation deadlines
• When necessary, performance counsel team members to established company guidelines; ensuring appraisals are conducted and succession plans established for the store, exit interviews are conducted when appropriate
• Delivers reviews and goal setting for all team members and seeks support from the Regional Manager to create development and performance improvement plans
• Deeply understand, model, and coach the Aje Ways of Working, policies, and procedures and other Aje specific guidelines
• Responsible for the recruitment of high calibre team members that fulfill the company requirements, taking into consideration succession planning strategies who reflect the company philosophy
• Lead a seamless and inspirational onboarding for all new store team members
• To supervise team members and provide guidance to the Assistant Managers in their supervision of team members
• To embrace the company training initiatives and ensure that training follow-up is undertaken so that team members understand that there is an expectation that they make improvements as a result of the training attended
• Responsible for the Management of the staff wardrobe, ensure all team members are adhering to the staff look book guide
• Recognises opportunities for the store to improve across all customer & operational touchpoints and delivers the required training on the spot or in a group setting
• Continuously assesses and looks out for potential new Aje employees in the store area

CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE JOURNEY

• Provide exemplary service experiences to Aje guests, ensuring consistently memorable and inspiring customer journeys
• Maintaining an in-depth knowledge of the product and brand to provide advice and recommendations as needed through communicating benefits, fabric properties, fit and styling
• Responsible for establishing and building VIP clientele
• Responsible for customer and VIP customer follow-ups, through multiple touch point channels to ensure they are kept educated with regards to new deliveries, upcoming promotional activity, and events
• First point of contact for general customer inquiries such as customer complaints and refunds to ensure customer satisfaction is received through implementation of consistent best practices.
• Identify key customer trends and requests; communicate effectively to Regional Manager relevant corporate partners to support continuous improvement and innovation of the Aje brand experience
• Responsible for providing the team with customer updates, feedback, and reports, that will allow them to continuously develop their sales techniques

VISUAL MERCHANDISING & STOCK MANAGEMENT

• To work with the Visual Merchandisers to ensure they are maintaining visual merchandising standards and merchandising products to maximise sales potential – taking into consideration actual sales results and category results.
• Ensure the team prepare for and execute the VM direction set by the business
• To promote VM feedback to ensure that the product is in the right place at the right time to maximize sales opportunities.
• Ensure your designated storage space is kept to high operational standard and make refilling practical
• To provide feedback to the Regional Manager and or General Manager- Retail & Customer Experience on stock opportunities, or issues with stock through EOD emails

ADMINISTRATION PROCESSES

• Provide a Daily Store Performance Report and a Weekly Store Performance Report
• Ensure all reports and analysis are clearly communicated to the Regional Manager
• Ensure systems are in place to control the loss of revenue due to theft, poor administration, error, and waste at the store level.
• Responsible for the completion of rosters for the month ahead. These rosters must be developed to the hours budget set and signed off by the Regional Manager before communicating with team members
• Responsible for approving timesheets on a daily basis
• Ensure that team members fulfil all administrative requirements.
• To ensure that all administrative tasks are completed and submitted in line with company expectations on a daily, weekly, monthly, seasonal basis.
• Ensuring all correspondence is actioned according to company standard i.e. memos, emails etc.

FINANCIAL

• Accountable for all store KPIs within their region
• Ensure team members are aware of their Aje financial budget and given the tools, training, and support to achieve them
• Communicates store financial targets, goals and progress to the team at the start of every shift as well as regularly throughout the day
• Motivate and encourage team members to achieve their financial budgets.
• Ensure team members are aware of category budgets and KPI results to capitalise on every sale opportunity.
• To develop an understanding of the customer profile for their store to enhance stock consolidations, promotional opportunities etc., to increase sales. Providing feedback on opportunities for the store – stock, location, promotion etc.
• To ensure that all transfers into the store are accepted correctly and any discrepancies are alerted to the Retail Operation Coordinator.
• Complete daily banking, unless otherwise stipulated by the Regional Manager.
• Carefully monitor spends in areas of petty cash, telephone, electricity in line with budgets set by Head Office.
• Create engaging tools to support Area & National focuses to drive results

EXPECTED SKILLS AND BEHAVIOURS

• Previous experience managing a team within customer service or the Retail Industry
• Brand ambassador, passionate about fostering strong relationships with key guests
• Customer centric mentality with all aspects of the role relating back to building client bases and exceeding expectations
• Effective communication and presentation skills that allows you to build relationships with customers, team members and key stakeholders of the business
• A proven track record of understanding and achieving performance indicators in a customer facing environment
• Lead by example by acting professionally, punctual, and dependable at all times
• Knows, accepts and follows all policies and procedures
• Continuously train and coach all team members through individual performance and future progression plans
• Uses initiative and decision-making skills, whilst ensuring all decisions are aligned to Aje Collective and the boutique
• The ability to use initiative when problem solving and resolving conflict
• Ability to multitask, prioritise, and manage time effectively within a fast-paced environment