Associate Director: People & Culture – Retail

Company Overview

The company is building India's first global sports company by integrating world-class product innovation, manufacturing excellence, iconic brands, and a comprehensive retail ecosystem. It focuses on creating category-defining products and experiences for athletes and consumers, with a vision to build businesses with global ambition.

Its integrated sportswear ecosystem includes:

• Manufacturing: One of India's largest sports footwear manufacturers, producing for global brands.

• Consumer Brands: Building and expanding international and homegrown sports brands across multiple markets.

• Multi-brand Retail: Developing premium multi-brand sports retail concepts, offering Indian consumers a curated selection and world-class retail experiences.

Job Summary

The Associate Director: People & Culture – Retail will lead the Retail People & Culture agenda across an expanding portfolio of retail concepts and brands. The role is responsible for building a high-performing retail organization with the right talent, strong customer orientation, consistent training, and robust people governance nationwide.

The position requires a strategic leader who can drive people productivity, engagement, retention, and performance while fostering a customer-first culture.

Responsibilities

• Own and execute the Retail People & Culture strategy across all retail concepts and stores.

• Lead end-to-end hiring for store teams, including Store Managers, Assistant Managers, and frontline retail staff.

• Build strong retail talent pipelines to support rapid store expansion across India.

• Design and implement retail training and capability programs covering customer experience, selling skills, product knowledge, leadership, and brand experience.

• Foster a strong customer-first culture throughout the retail organization.

• Partner with Retail Business Heads to enhance people productivity, engagement, retention, and performance.

• Establish consistent people processes, policies, compliance, and governance across the retail network.

• Drive effective onboarding and induction programs for frontline teams across multiple brands and formats.

• Develop career paths, succession plans, and internal mobility opportunities for retail talent.

• Track and improve key retail people metrics, including attrition, hiring turnaround time (TAT), productivity, training effectiveness, and employee engagement.

• Conduct regular store visits and people audits to identify on-ground challenges and ensure consistent execution.

• Collaborate with business leaders to identify people-related issues and opportunities across markets and implement timely interventions.

• Build and scale a strong Retail People & Culture team as the business grows.

Qualifications

• 10 to 14 years of experience in Retail HR or People & Culture, preferably with large retail networks.

• Proven experience managing frontline, store, and regional retail populations across multiple cities.

• Strong expertise in retail hiring, training, employee engagement, and people governance.

• Deep understanding of customer-centric retail environments and frontline capability building.

• Experience working with multiple brands, formats, or retail concepts is preferred.

• Excellent leadership, communication, and interpersonal skills.

• Ability to manage a high-travel, high-ownership role with a hands-on approach.

• A Bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Business Administration, or a related field. Advanced degrees or HR certifications are advantageous.

Preferred Skills

• Experience in multi-brand retail environments.

• Strong analytical skills to track and improve people metrics.

• Ability to build and lead diverse teams in a fast-paced, expanding retail network.

• Proficiency in designing and delivering training programs tailored to retail operations.

Experience

• 10 to 14 years of relevant experience in Retail HR or People & Culture roles.

• Experience managing large-scale retail operations and diverse teams across multiple locations.

Environment

• Location: Bangalore.

• Requires extensive travel to retail locations across India.

• Involves working in a dynamic, fast-growing retail environment with multiple brands and store formats.

• High ownership and on-ground presence are essential to building teams and culture consistently.