Format Planning & Deployment Lead

Format Planning and Deployment Lead 
£40,000 - £45,000 plus great benefits (WL6A)
Manchester City Centre / Hybrid Working (in this role, you’ll split your time between home working and coming into the office two days a week (Tuesday and Wednesday) 
12-month secondment

We're looking for a Format Planning and Deployment Lead to help turn strategy into successful store change.

Here at Co-op, we're continually evolving our stores, formats, and operations to create better experiences for our customers, members, and colleagues. This role will play a key role in delivering that transformation.

As a Format Planning and Deployment Lead, you'll provide the planning, coordination, governance, and deployment assurance that underpins our Format and Innovation change portfolio. You'll bring visibility and control across multiple programmes, making sure that initiatives are well planned, deployment-ready, and delivered with minimal disruption across our store estate.

If you're a highly organised planner who enjoys working across complex programmes, influencing others, and bringing structure to change delivery, we'd love to hear from you.

What you'll do

• Own and maintain the integrated Planning and Deployment Portfolio Plan
• Coordinate delivery plans across multiple programmes and workstreams, making sure that dependencies, risks and actions are tracked and reported
• Provide deployment assurance and challenge readiness, so that initiatives can be successfully implemented in stores
• Lead and support portfolio governance activities
• Support the Planning Deployment Manager to track and report portfolio performance, providing meaningful insights on progress, risks, budget status, delivery confidence, and key dependencies
• Create roadmaps, deployment plans, and portfolio reporting that support clear decision-making and communication
• Work closely with key internal partners to align plans and resolve issues
• Support budget reviews and forecasting activities, making sure we have financial transparency across the portfolio
• Drive continuous improvement in planning processes, governance frameworks, reporting tools, and ways of working

What you'll bring

We're looking for someone who combines strong planning discipline with excellent stakeholder management skills. You'll need:
• Experience supporting projects, change initiatives, programmes, portfolios, or PMO activity
• Great planning and organisational skills, with the ability to juggle multiple priorities and keep things moving
• To be comfortable using project management tools and working within governance and delivery frameworks
• Confidence working with budgets, forecasts, and financial reporting
• Strong communication and relationship-building skills, with the ability to turn complex information into clear updates and reports
• Good working knowledge of Microsoft Office, especially Excel, PowerPoint and Teams
• A proactive approach, taking ownership, looking for ways to improve how things are done, and understanding how change impacts customers, colleagues and frontline teams

Why Co-op?

At Co-op, we’re owned by our members. And because we’re owned by you, we can do right by you. So when you join us, you’re not just taking a job, you’re joining a movement. We’re an organisation that puts people and communities first, and we’re powered by purpose. We want this to be a place where you can thrive, so you’ll also receive:

• An annual bonus (based on personal and business performance)
• 28 days holiday (rising to 32 with service) plus bank holidays 
• A pension with up to 10% employer contributions 
• Access to a subsidised onsite gym (at our Manchester HQ) 
• 30% discount on Co-op products and 10% off other brands 
• Stream – early access to a percentage of your pay as you earn it 
• Virtual healthcare including GP appointments, mental health support, nutrition and fitness advice 
• 24/7 colleague support service 
• Training and support for your development and career progression
• Cycle-to-work scheme

A place you’ll belong

We’re building diverse and inclusive teams that reflect the communities we serve. We welcome applications from everyone and are committed to creating a workplace where colleagues can feel like they belong, supported by our inclusive policies and the ways we work.

We’re proud to be part of the Disability Confident scheme and offer interviews to disabled candidates who meet the minimum criteria for a job. If you need any adjustments during the recruitment process, we’ll support you.

Learn more about our recruitment process at jobs.coop.co.uk/apply-process and our inclusion commitments at jobs.coop.co.uk/diversity-inclusion.