Helen Owen

Experience

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  IAMCO Partners

  Jun 2006 - Oct 2008

  Associate

  Worked on projects investigating market entry opportunities, carrying out commercial due diligence and strategic reviews. Clients included Cadbury, E.ON, Diageo and Johnson Matthey.- Working alongside the client team on site, carried out a full strategic review for Cadbury Nigeria. Identified opportunities for growth and cost reduction on the confectionery side of the business. Evaluated the potential of opportunities and provided recommendations to the Board. Our recommendations resulted in a successful turnaround for the business. - Advised E.ON as to whether to outsource their engineering services function. - Undertook financial benchmarking exercise for an FMCG client, tracking a range of financial KPIs, e.g. total shareholder return, ROCE, sales growth, etc. over a number of years for c. 15 peers. Show less

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  Royal Mail Group

  Jan 2009 - Aug 2010

  Strategy Analyst

  Part of a newly set up Group strategy team designed to manage cross business unit projects that spanned Post Office, Royal Mail Letters and Parcelforce.- Led a project team of 20 people, aiming to simplify the customer offer of mail products in Post Offices - Carried out customer research to understand their needs and built a financial model that assessed the profitability of different scenarios in order to balance customer needs and financial viability- Made recommendations to the Boards of Royal Mail Letters, Parcelforce and Post Office. Many of these recommendations have since been rolled out. Show less

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  Tesco PLC

  Sept 2010 - Apr 2015

  Managed a team of six project managers with responsibility for delivering simplifications and improvements to processes within Tesco stores. Reporting to the Stores Productivity Director, delivered payroll savings and proven sales increases through cross-functional collaboration. Projects spanned service areas of the store, with a focus on checkouts and service desks.- Developed the Scan as you Shop solution, growing it to be in 325 stores, with a million customers per week using it at peak. Over a two year period, managed a £45m capital budget, delivering a return on investment of over 30%. Implemented the solution to new stores, increased usage and further developed the solution. - Defined the future strategy for Scan as you Shop and built a 3-5 year roadmap. This including making the solution financially viable for all formats of store and mapping out software development required to improve the customer experience- Established a programme of work and business case to improve the customer journey and make best use of the £165m of payroll spent annually at the service desks in store (Customer Service Desk, Electrical Desk, Click+Collect)- Effectively managed resource allocation for 25 project managers across the department.- Stretched the team such that some members were rated as 'exceptional' (c. top 10% in the business). - Outperformed comparison groups on all questions in the ‘your manager’ section of a colleague satisfaction survey.- Facilitated quarterly community days to support Tesco’s value of ‘Use our scale for good’. Show less Co-ordinated multiple cross-functional projects and supported other project managers in the team; focused on checkouts, aiming to reduce an addressable cost base of £500m.- Developed and successfully launched a new methodology for calculating the number of self service checkouts a store needed. This enabled us to justify continued installation of self service checkouts, delivering both customer and financial benefits.- Successfully trialled an intelligent cash drawer and created the business case for rollout. A £10m capital investment was approved and a return on investment of 24% delivered. Show less

  • Programme Manager, Service Productivity

    Apr 2013 - Apr 2015

  • Team Leader, Service Productivity

    May 2011 - Apr 2013

  • Project Manager, Service Productivity

    Sept 2010 - May 2011
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  Aldi UK

  Aug 2015 - May 2017

  Global Business Coordination Manager

  Reporting to the Global Business Coordination Director, joined a newly created team set up to deliver a global IT transformation. Part of the UK based team, with global responsibility for ‘Customer Interaction’, i.e. Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Marketing and eCommerce systems. As the Business Lead for the CRM solution, gathered requirements, evaluated and selected a software solution, managed international stakeholders and created a business case to justify €multimillion investment.- Gathered requirements from all ALDI South countries (UK, Germany, Austria, Australia and US) through a series of workshops, following up with in-country validation sessions.- Evaluated a number of vendors and selected two to proceed to competing, fully integrated proof of concepts spanning CRM, Marketing and eCommerce solutions, run by two System Integrators (Deloitte and Accenture). Systems tested included Salesforce, SAP (C4C, hybris Commerce and hybris Marketing), Adobe Analytics and Adobe Experience Manager. - In a Product Owner role, worked as part of a scrum team to prioritise user stories and to review and feed back during two week sprints. C. 200 CRM related user stories were developed during the 14 week proof of concept, resulting in a thorough understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of the systems.- Ran a series of in-country presentations to showcase the results from the proof of concepts; stakeholders ranged from Customer Service Agent to Managing Director level. Our software recommendation was supported globally.- Onboarded new members of the team in preparation for the ‘build’ phase, globally co-ordinated from Germany. Show less

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  Halfords

  Jun 2017 - Jan 2019

  Head of Continuous Improvement

  Hired into a new role reporting into the Business Transformation Director. Tasked with building on a continuous improvement function within Retail and introducing Lean to the broader organisation across Logistics, Autocentres and all Support Centre functions.- Facilitated value stream mapping exercises on complex cross-functional processes (returns, purchase to pay) to map the as-is and identify opportunities for improvement.- Devised and delivered interactive training materials to over 200 colleagues to introduce the concepts of Lean and CI. - Onboarded champions from multiple functions and supported them to create their own CI plans and implement improvements. - Made changes to the way discounts were accepted in store, resulting in c. £3m annualised benefits.- Introduced a process library and ensured that any processes mapped fitted into the overall structure. Show less

• 

  Primark

  Mar 2019 - Jul 2019

  Project Manager

  Working for the People Transformation Programme Manager, I worked on a contract basis to lead the key project to select and introduce a workforce management system in Primark’s retail stores globally. In addition to this, I supported the Programme Manager to progress other workstreams within the People Transformation Programme.- Mapped the as-is and to-be business processes for all HR processes, including recruitment, training, time and attendance and scheduling, and performance management.- Gathered the business requirements for a workforce management system, defining the sensible scope of a new system.- Highlighted the need for a labour model in order to make best use of a workforce management system, introduced a SME in this area and supported with the scoping of this work.- Set up and ran a panel of international business stakeholders to ensure engagement and buy in.- Managed the vendor selection process - quickly scanning the market for suitable vendors, evaluating and shortlisting the most appropriate before preparing vendor demos and then an RFI and RFP process. - Undertook a full evaluation of the RFP responses and made recommendation to the client for which vendor to proceed to a proof of concept with.Left the project at this stage due to going on maternity leave. Show less

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  Primark

  Sept 2020 - Jun 2021

  Transformation Programme Manager

  Returning from maternity leave, I reported directly to the Head of People Systems to lead the Transformation Programme. - Managed seven projects on the programme, led by six Project Managers- Engaged senior stakeholders (up to Exec Team level) to keep them abreast of progress and risks and issues- Managed vendors, agreeing statements of work and working collaboratively with them to progress the programme- Supported Project Managers to troubleshoot when issues arose

• 

  Wild Imaginations Ltd

  Mar 2021 - Aug 2022

  MD and Cofounder

  During the winter lockdown in 2021, I identified a gap in the market and set up an an outdoor stay and play business for toddlers and babies in Birmingham. I ran this alongside a contract / being pregnant / on maternity leave and was proud to win an award of 'Best Children's Outdoor Play Session Provider', alongside 100% 5* Google and Facebook reviews.

• 

  Pepco

  Oct 2022 - Oct 2024

  Project Manager (Contract)
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  ARDEN DENTAL LABORATORY LIMITED

  Sept 2023 - now

  Director

  Providing administrative, strategic and marketing support to my husband’s dental laboratory business

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  Gymshark

  Nov 2024 - now

  Project Manager (Contract)