Senior Technology Director - Merchandise Planning

Lululemon Athletica; Washington; Hybrid; USD 223,000 - 293,000; Full time

Job summary

lululemon seeks a Senior Director of Technology to define and execute a multi-year strategy transforming merchandising planning and allocations. You will modernize the suite of planning solutions, scale capabilities for assortment, space, and size planning, and embed AI-driven automation to speed decision-making with historical and forward-looking insights.

You will lead a global engineering organization across North America and India, stewarding platforms and vendor ecosystems that serve

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science or related field.
• 5+ years of engineering leadership and delivery experience.
• 5+ years in retail, merchandise planning and allocations, or related field is a bonus.
• Demonstrated experience translating business strategy into technology and engineering roadmaps.
• Demonstrated experience in data-heavy planning systems such as Anaplan, Oracle RPAS, etc.

Responsibilities

• Lead multi-year technology strategy for merchandising planning and allocations.
• Modernize merchandise planning and AI-driven automation to compress planning cycles.
• Manage global, cross-functional engineering teams across North America and India.
• Partner with AI/ML and Data COE to design scalable, secure AI-enabled systems.
• Translate merchandising and planning vision into a multi-year solution realization strategy.

Skills

Python

Java

AWS

GCP

Azure

ML fundamentals

NLP

Computer vision

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in computer science

Master's degree in CS/Applied math/statistics

Tools

Anaplan

Oracle RPAS

TensorFlow

PyTorch

scikit-learn

Job description

Senior Technology Director - Merchandise Planning

Business Unit: Store Support Centre (SSC)

lululemon is an innovative performance apparel company for yoga, running, training, and other athletic pursuits. Setting the bar in technical fabrics and functional design, we create transformational products and experiences that support people in moving, growing, connecting, and being well. We owe our success to our innovative product, emphasis on stores, commitment to our people, and the incredible connections we make in every community we're in. As a company, we focus on creating positive change to build a healthier, thriving future. In particular, that includes creating an equitable, inclusive and growth-focused environment for our people.

About this team

Global Product Technology (GPT) delivers the platforms and capabilities that power lululemon’s product lifecycle – from 2D/3D design and development to merchandising, sourcing, assortment planning, master data management, and go to market. We partner closely with design, technical development, merchandising, sourcing, and planning functions to accelerate speed to market and elevate quality through PLM modernization, digital product creation, data and integration platforms, assortment planning, size planning, master data management, analytics, decision-making solutions, and AI assisted workflows.

The role

We’re seeking a Senior Director Technology to define and execute a multi year technology strategy that transforms how lululemon merchandises, plans, and deliver products to our guests. This leader will modernize the merchandise planning and allocations suite of solutions and related integration stacks, scale our capabilities to enable assortment planning, space planning, size planning, and embed AI-driven automation to compress planning cycles and unlock better business decision-making through both historical and forward looking insights. You will lead a global, multi disciplinary engineering organization across North America and India, stewarding platforms, products, and vendor ecosystems that serve our merchants and planners end to end.

The ideal candidate will have a history of demonstrated results leading large, cross-functional, and global teams to accomplish transformational initiatives across functional/matrixed organizations. They must thrive in fast-paced environments, be able to manage through ambiguity and complexity, commission charters and empower teams to create and simplify processes, and simultaneously support a growing global organization. This role requires excellent communication, organizational skills, and the ability to drive ideas from concept to execution. Maturity, curiosity, creative problem solving, and team leadership are all essential for success in this role.

Key responsibilities:

• Collaborate with internal stakeholders, drive change initiatives, and foster a culture of continuous improvement to keep pace with the organization’s growth strategy.
• Manage resources, oversee financial interests, and implement essential policies, practices, and processes.
• Evident leadership skills, a proven track record of building strong teams, setting high performance standards, challenging people to excel and eliciting their sustained high performance.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills is essential.
• Drive world-class engineering solutions that are reliable, observable, secure, compliant, and highly available.
• Blend deep technical expertise with visionary leadership, to guide a globally dispersed engineering team that drives platform and solution modernization with advanced AI capabilities such as LLMs, vector retrieval, computer vision, and intelligent agents.
• You will partner with AI/ML and Data COE to drive the design and implementation of scalable, secure, and responsible AI/ML enabled systems that bridge merchandising, and planning - ensuring technology accelerates decisions‑making.
• Translate lululemon’s merchandising and planning vision into a multi‑year solution realization strategy.
• Leverage AI and ML solutions to drive measurable impact across planning capabilities that include attributes generation, demand forecasting, allocation optimization, store clustering, etc.
• Translate complex AI/ML architectures into clear narratives for executive stakeholders.
• Champion transparency, inclusion, and ethics as core enablers of innovation.
• Develop future‑ready leaders capable of balancing technical depth and business acumen to drive meaningful growth.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, or related field.
• 5+ years of engineering leadership and delivery experience.
  
• 5+ years in retail, merchandise planning and allocations, or related field is a bonus.
  
• Demonstrated experience in managing large budgets.
  
• Demonstrated experience translating business strategy into technology and engineering roadmaps.
  
• Demonstrated experience in data‑heavy planning systems such as Anaplan, Oracle RPAS, etc.
  
• Expert proficiency in programming languages (eg: Python, Java), and relevant libraries/frameworks (TensorFlow, PyTorch, scikit‑learn, etc).
  
• Good understanding of machine learning, NLP, computer vision, and generative AI techniques.
  
• Able to produce documentation such as narratives and root cause analysis providing actionable insights.
  
• Hands on experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, Azure), and MLOps tools.
  
• Strong knowledge of data engineering concepts and big data.
  
• Continuous learning mindset that stays on the leading edge of applied ML, LLM’s and NLP advancements.
  
• Exceptional communication and storytelling skills for executive audiences.
  
• Master’s in computer science, applied mathematics, statistics is a bonus.
  

must haves

• Acknowledge the presence of choice in every moment and take personal responsibility for your life.
• Possess an entrepreneurial spirit and continuously innovate to achieve great results.
• Communicate with honesty and kindness and create the space for others to do the same.
• Lead with courage, knowing the possibility of greatness is bigger than the fear of failure.
• Foster connection by putting people first and building trusting relationships.
• Integrate fun and joy as a way of being and working, aka doesn’t take yourself too seriously.

additional notes

Applicants must be authorized to work for ANY employer in the U.S. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment visa at this time for this role.

compensation and benefits package

lululemon’s compensation offerings are grounded in a pay-for-performance philosophy that recognizes exceptional individual and teamperformance. Thetypical hiring range for this position is from$223,100 – $292,800annually; the base pay offered is based on market location and may vary depending on job-related knowledge, skills, experience, and internal equity. As part of our total rewards offering, permanent employees in this position may be eligible for our competitive annual bonus program and equity offerings, subject to program eligibility requirements.

At lululemon, investing in our people is a top priority. We believe that when life works, work works. We strive to be the place where inclusive leaders come to develop and enable all to be well. Recognizing our teams for their performance and dedication, other components of our total rewards offerings include support of career development, wellbeing, and personal growth:

• Extended health and dental benefits, and mental health plans
• Paid time off
• Savings and retirement plan matching
• Parenthood top-up
• Extensive catalog of development course offerings
• People networks, mentorship programs, and leadership series (to name a few)

Note: The incentive programs, benefits, and perks have certain eligibility requirements. The Company reserves the right to alter these incentive programs, benefits, and perks in whole or in part at any time without advance notice.

workplace arrangement

Hybrid

In-person collaboration and connection is important to our culture. Work is performed onsite, minimum 4 days per week.

Only those applicants under consideration will be contacted. Please accept our utmost appreciation for your interest. Lululemon is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. Employment decisions are based on merit and business needs, and not on race, color, creed, age, sex, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, marital status, medical condition, physical or mental disability, military service, pregnancy, childbirth and related medical conditions or any other classification protected by federal, state or provincial and local laws and ordinances. Reasonable accommodation is available for qualified individuals with disabilities, upon request. This Equal Employment Opportunity policy applies to all practices relating to recruitment and hiring, compensation, benefits, discipline, transfer, termination and all other terms and conditions of employment. While management is primarily responsible for seeing that Lululemon equal employment opportunity policies are implemented, you share in the responsibility for assuring that, by your personal actions, the policies are effective.

lululemon is committed to providing reasonable accommodation to applicants with disabilities. If you would like someone from our team to contact you for individualized support, email us [e-mail] . In your email, please include the position title, the location of the position and the nature of your request.
The use of AI tools, including but not limited to ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Gemini, DeepSeek, or any other AI‑assisted software, is strictly prohibited during the interview process. This includes, AI-generated responses, content creation, or any form of automated assistance in live interviews, case studies, technical assessments, or written submissions.
At lululemon, we are committed to privacy, integrity, transparency, and ethical hiring practices. Our commitment to responsible AI ensures that proprietary information is protected and that all hiring decisions are based on an individual’s own skills, judgment, and expertise without AI assistance. Any use of AI during the interview process will result in immediate disqualification. lululemon reserves the right to use AI detection tools to verify the authenticity of candidate responses.