Retail Store Development Project Coordinator (12 Month FTC)

Company Description
Ralph Lauren Corporation (NYSE:RL) is a global leader in the design, marketing and distribution of premium lifestyle products in five categories: apparel, accessories, home, fragrances, and hospitality. For more than 50 years, Ralph Lauren's reputation and distinctive image have been consistently developed across an expanding number of products, brands and international markets. The Company's brand names, which include Ralph Lauren, Ralph Lauren Collection, Ralph Lauren Purple Label, Polo Ralph Lauren, Double RL, Lauren Ralph Lauren, Polo Ralph Lauren Children, Chaps, and Club Monaco, among others, constitute one of the world's most widely recognized families of consumer brands

Position Overview
Support the Retail Store Development Manager in the coordination and administration of opening new, refurbishing or closing existing stores and ad-hoc projects throughout EMEA.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities
New Stores and Refurbishments
* Produce, maintain and publish new and refurbishment project calendars ensuring they are issued and updated in a timely manner throughout the process and aligned with the RLS master CPA.
* Call out and coordinate project milestone dates for all relevant departments, highlighting risks and opportunities to the Retail Store Development Manager.
* Coordinate the store opening & closing process by owning the agenda, minutes and action points of project kick off and work in progress meetings.
* Attend project worksites for relevant meetings including on site project management of the merchandising period between the HO from construction to store opening.
* Coordinate all project deliveries ensuring purchase orders and vendor invoices are raised, receipted and paid in a timely fashion to meet project milestones.
* Ensure cross functional business supplies and country specific documentation is in place for opening & closing; including but not limited to treasury, POS equipment and store insurance.
* Tender store opening supply categories to ensure goods and services are purchased at market competitive rates.
* Record and track all financials relating to opening new and refurbished stores by maintaining the store opening cost tracker.
* Prepare monthly spend summaries and forecasts for the store opening budget.
* Assist in creating opening & closing cost budgets for forthcoming projects.
* Create and maintain store opening project files, manage drawings and all relevant documentation by partnering with Polo Store Development ensuring the department shared data archive is accurate and up to date with appropriate version control.
* Publish approved department communication on the Corporate Retail Web intranet site.
* Publish and maintain the department notice board ensuring corporate teams have access to information about forthcoming projects.
* Coordinate the collection of all relevant project information to be passed to the corporate facilities department for the ongoing maintenance of the store including the O&M manual.
* Partner with facilities to ensure all relevant country specific code compliant repairs and maintenance contracts are awarded prior to opening and cancelled for closures.
* Manage the department workload in the absence of other Retail Store Development Coordinators.
* Communicate professionally at all levels including external business partners and senior internal management both face to face and on telephone conferences. Existing RLS Portfolio
* Regularly audit department data archives to ensure As Built drawings are up to date.
* Ensure the Store Master-list contains an accurate summary of the RLS estate to be issued on the corporate intranet site.

Experience, Skills & Knowledge
· Previous experience of working in a similar role and estate geography. · Microsoft office, especially Project, Excel & Power Point. · Proficiency in reading and interpreting 2 & 3D CAD drawings. · Strong organisational skills and ability to prioritize. · Negotiate costs & terms for goods and services relating to new stores. · Team worker. · Self starter, able to use own initiative and provide solutions to problems. · Strong written and verbal communication skills, second European language advantageous. · Proven finisher.