Wilko’s new CEO Mark Jackson has announced a new senior leadership team, as the household and garden retailer implements its plan to stabilise the business and accelerate the turnaround.
Mark Jackson comments: “We’ve already begun our turnaround programme to drive wilko forward. As part of this we quickly identified significant changes to the wilko operating model to enable us to stabilise the business, and then thrive again.
“We’ve reviewed our strategic plan and have set three priorities:
- Getting the business in better shape
- Drive sales both instore and online
- Driving down operating costs”
“To enable a step change in business performance, and in order to drive our turnaround plan, we’ve put in place a more streamlined senior leadership team:
- Dave Murphy – Group Finance Director becomes Chief Finance Officer replacing Karen Mackay, who has resigned from the company and will be leaving in March, following a handover period
- Amanda Jones – Retail Director will take on the new role of Chief Operating Officer with responsibility for stores, logistics, and central operations
- Deborah Rabey – joins as Interim Chief Customer Officer to lead the commercial, digital and marketing teams. Deborah is a very accomplished commercial director with a wealth of experience across supply chains, global sourcing and marketing following 14 years at director level with Tesco
- Philippa McNamara continues as MD of the product development unit – Kin Limited
- Anne-Marie Haydock is promoted into the HR Director role to replace Kate Price who is leaving the business in April, following a handover period
- James Dorling continues in his role as Property, Procurement and Transformation Director
“To deliver our strategic priorities we must remain focused, and our leadership structure needs to be fully aligned to achieve this. Having now reviewed the current structure, we need to remove both the duplication of functions and operating costs. As part of this review, we’ve had to take some necessary and difficult decisions as we create a new operating structure that helps stabilise the business, from which we can then drive the business forward.
“Having now announced the new top leadership functions, we’ve already begun conversations with the senior management team and wider organisation to implement the new structure. This includes some changes to our management structure at both our stores and head office. Right now, we’re unable to confirm the scale of change as conversations are ongoing but it will mean a number of roles will be made redundant to support the wider plan.
“We’re fully supporting affected individuals as a result of these changes. Such change will be unsettling to our team members and the wider business, and we’re acting swiftly to put in place the new organisational structure.”
Wilko is the UK’s 23rd biggest retailer, employing 16,000 team members. It operates 400 stores across the UK and serves customers through wilko.com. The 93 year old retailer helps its customers with their everyday household and garden jobs across many categories, including garden, decorating & DIY and pet products.
