What Do You Actually Do? Episode 46: Heather Wilkinson, Aldi Graduate Area Manager Programme

/ yorkcareers

Listen to this and all the previous episodes.

The Aldi grad scheme has a reputation for being challenging, giving its grads a lot of responsibility and having great benefits. After 15 weeks on the scheme you’ll be put in charge of a store and after a year you’ll be an Area Manager. In this episode Heather Wilkinson tells us about how she got on the scheme and what it’s actually like.

Heather spent five years as an Area Manager with Aldi after going through the Aldi Graduate Area Manager Programme. In that time she managed five stores and was responsible for around 150 employees. She graduated with a degree in History and recently started a new role as Operations Manager at Amazon.

Useful links:

To hear more Leadership, Management, grad scheme and international work and travel related podcast stories:

Transcript:

Kate:

You’re listening to the ‘What Do You Actually Do?’ podcast. Each week we want to bring you an inspiring interview, a useful tip or encouraging message to help you find your place in the professional world. Hello and welcome to this episode of ‘What Do You Actually Do?’. My name’s Kate Morris and I’ll be your host today. In today’s episode we’ll be talking about taking time out after graduating, and working in retail management. Today we’re joined by Heather Wilkinson, who’s an Area Manager at Aldi. So, Heather, what do you actually do?

Heather: 

So overall I run five stores based in Northumberland and North Newcastle. So I directly manage five store managers across a series of KPI metrics, and I’m also in charge of the equipment, and personal development of about 150 personnel employees. 

Kate: 

So that’s a lot of people. 

Heather: 

Yeah, a lot of people, a lot of ownership and responsibility given from the get-go, really. So I think as soon as I joined the grad scheme, coming up on five years ago now, and as soon as you join you kind of get stuck straight in, get given loads of responsibility, which is fantastic because you get an opportunity to have an impact really quickly. 

Kate: 

So what are the key elements of your role? How does it work? You’ve said you’ve got over a 100 people that report to you, but what are the other things that you’re responsible for? 

Heather: 

The main objective of my role essentially is to drive the highest sales possible, whilst maintaining a minimal cost base. Essentially what that means is – I people-manage a lot. It’s down to, really, leadership, so to motivate our teams, to make sure they’re highly engaged, and store managers and being really proactive in driving sales, whilst managing their KPIs essentially. So quite a lot outside the box thinking, a lot of change management and process management. And essentially it’s motivating and inspiring those managers to achieve the best results possible. 

Kate: 

So how’s your day different from normal? How’s the pandemic impacted on it? 

Heather: 

It’s been obviously a bit of a crazy year. If you think back to a year ago now, we looked at panic buying. So sales went up quite significantly and we had huge queues waiting to get in the stores. So I kind of got stuck in with the guys on the shop floor, So I got my store t-shirt back out, and was helping to make sure we provide the best experience for the customer. Obviously there’s been a lot of changes in terms of social distancing, as we’ve got a lot of procedures in place as a business, that make sure both staff and customers are safe within the store environment. So we have to make sure that all of those policies are adhered to. Obviously cleaning stations, social distancing and customer cuts within the store as well. So there is a lot to manage from a process perspective for Covid. 

Kate: 

And what about you? Were you, sort of, prior to the pandemic, travelling about to the different stores and areas that you were responsible for? Are you just working from home now or are you still able to do that? How’s that side of it working? 

Heather: 

So I’m still out in the field. Our job is very kind of hands-on within the operations, so I really need to be in my stores, helping to support them and helping to see what’s going on. So throughout the whole pandemic I’ve still been completing my job through store visits. There was a period of time when we had a limited amount of stores we could go to per day, so I had to adapt a little bit and use maybe FaceTime with the store managers to show me things on the shop floor. But obviously, just adhering to all social distance rules, and still being able to kind of visit my stores for my job that way. 

Kate: 

Sometimes people assume that you’ve got to study Economics or Management to get on a grad scheme, but you did your degree in History. So what was your starting point and where did your interest in retail management come from? 

Heather: 

Yeah, so I studied History, and when I went to university I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, as I’m sure a lot of people don’t. And there are a lot of options and a lot of graduate schemes out there. I knew I didn’t want to do anything particularly history related, I just wanted to take the skills from that. I suppose what appealed to me about Aldi, rather than it being the retail sector specifically, it was the opportunity provided to have kind of full ownership and responsibility of your own area. It genuinely feels like running your own business; you have a large amount of autonomy to make decisions and you are held accountable for them. So I really wanted to be given the chance to prove that young people can lead successfully and jump straight in, really. 

Kate: 

And you took a kind of a gap year after graduation, working and travelling around New Zealand. How did this time out impact on your career? 

Heather: 

Yeah, massive. I think that’s quite a large part of probably why I got the job. Essentially I went to New Zealand for six months, and we bought a camper van for three thousand New Zealand dollars. Basically, we just drove around the country, trying to find work everywhere to kind of get the money for the next night’s accommodation and move on to the next place. It was definitely a very grounding experience. We were out there, and kind of had to make it work. Maybe went across a little bit naively in terms of the money that we’d need to make over there. So definitely the life experience I gained, the independence, and the people I met – definitely put me in a good stead to come back and start a career within people management. 

Kate: 

It sounds like an amazing experience. It’s interesting because sometimes people assume that to be attractive to a top graduate employer you’ve got to kind of commit yourself just to getting that directly relevant experience, and trying to break into the grad scheme as early as possible, and not have any kind of gap between once you’ve graduated and once you start your job. But it sounds like, from what you’re saying, that experience allows you to test those skills of really having to have that responsibility with financial targets, and probably that confidence in yourself that you can survive and you can manage. It sounds like that was one of the key things that perhaps stood out when you were applying to Aldi, and sort of competing against others in the assessment centres and those kinds of things. 

Heather: 

I think one of the great things about Aldi is: a large part of why we are recruited is because of our personality. And essentially those kinds of character-building experiences are really important. Obviously, academic intelligence is important and that gets you through the gateway, but essentially that doesn’t make you successful at the job. You’ve got to be able to have emotional intelligence when you’re managing people. And obviously that comes with time and practice, and experience, and we all kind of make mistakes along the way. But doing something like that – it makes you more mature in your outlook on life, it allows you to relate to people a lot easier, instead of coming straight fresh from university. I definitely found it developed me personally a lot. 

Kate: 

It sounds like the sort of interpersonal skills are really important, as well as those intellectual skills. What are the kind of personal strengths or qualities would you say you need to have, not just to sort of be good at the role, but to actually enjoy it, to be sort of happy and successful in retail management? 

Heather: 

Yeah, I think you’ve got to be incredibly driven, and self driven as well. We are all very competitive as an Area Management team. So the region that I work in there is seventeen of us, and how we’re measured across KPIs is all based on a balanced scorecard approach. So we do have league tables, and it requires a lot of really wanting to be the best and to give 110%. It’s long hours and really hard work, but it’s super rewarding. So I think as long as you’re prepared to be that committed and that driven to yourself and the business, then you will be successful. It requires a lot of organisation as well, so I plan my own diary and calendar, choose my own days off, plan around the jobs I need to do and when. So that gives me a lot of flexibility, but equally, it’s a large responsibility because you have to make sure that everything gets done. And then I’d say probably resilience as well. There’s a lot of feedback given, particularly in your first year. You essentially work through all of the stages within Aldi – from stock assistant, store assistant, deputy store manager, assistant manager and store manager – within six months. You have to be able to perform all of those roles in that time, before you come into your Area Management training. So you do need to be resilient to constructive criticism, and developing yourself further, and really pushing yourself as far out of your comfort zone as you will go. 

Kate: 

It sounds like a really great environment if you are somebody who wants that challenge, and as you say, has that drive. What’s the best thing for you about the job? What sort of keeps it – because you’ve been doing it for a few years now – what sort of keeps you focussed on wanting to do more? 

Heather: 

Definitely the people. I’ve had the same area now for coming up to four years. So I’ve worked with the same store managers and the same team throughout that, and recruited a lot of them. And for me, the most rewarding part of the job is to see other people succeed. People that I’ve had as an apprentice have progressed through the business, and got promoted to be a deputy store manager, and then an assistant store manager. Or people that have joined externally as assistants to managers have been promoted to store manager. So to see those people in your team succeed is brilliant. And also now I’ve been here a while, I’m responsible… So I’m a mentor, so I train a lot of the graduates that join. So they’ll do the store training in one of my stores, and then they’ll come out and I’ll train them up to be an area manager. So really, the people are what gets me out of bed in the morning, seeing them succeed is the most rewarding part of the job. 

Kate: 

So what’s the worst bit of it? What’s the bit that you have to dig deep to do? 

Heather: 

It’s very pressurised and it’s extremely fast-paced, and essentially you have to have a lot of confidence in your own decisions. Sometimes you might not have all of the necessary information and you’ve got to make a decision, and kind of make it work. And so that can be particularly challenging. Also, bear in mind that we come in, so I was 22 when I started with Aldi, and one of my store managers has been with Aldi for twenty five years. So essentially, I’m coming into Aldi, almost fresh out of university, and managing somebody who’s been with Aldi longer than I’ve been alive, and is old enough to be my dad probably. So the way in which you go into that working relationship can be quite challenging. To come across in the right way and build that relationship with them, so that you can have a very cooperative and developmental relationship going forward. But that can definitely be a bit of an overwhelming challenge at the start. 

Kate: 

How did you manage that then? Because I can totally see how you might meet resistance, and kind of, just like, cynicism – “Oh, what could you know, you young girl” kind of thing. And you said at the start that you wanted to prove that a young person could lead, be a leader and have that drive and determination. So what was the thing that you feel managed to turn that relationship and other similar issues around? 

Heather: 

I think it’s mutual respect. And ultimately, like, you have to be an incredibly grounded person and humble yourself. Like yes, you came out of university to a fantastic job and an amazing opportunity. But essentially, I’ve learnt loads from my store management team over the years. And you just have to respect them for their knowledge, and approach conversations in a cooperative way, and show them that you’re just as committed and that we’re working towards the same goals, we’re a team, and essentially you’re doing things for the better of themselves and the store. Obviously sometimes that can lead into difficult conversations, but we do have a performance management as well as part of our job scope, to make sure that we are driving the best performance out of our managers. But I would say just being able to relate to them, and essentially to be yourself. Like people will work for a person, not a company, and if you are not true to yourself throughout the whole time, it is never really going to work. 

Kate: 

So you’ve mentioned how there’s been a lot of changes because of Covid. What do you think the other key challenge will be for the retail sector in general over the next few years? Is there anything that students who are thinking of wanting to break into the sector, is there anything they should be researching or trying to prepare for? 

Heather: 

Yeah, I think obviously the last year has been unprecedented, and obviously even going into this year and probably for the foreseeable couple of years in retail, we are having to react, based on different changes announced by the government. And it’s a very quick process change. Obviously the jobs from the graduate sector are quite competitive at the moment. However, we are still continuing to recruit area managers as we go through. So definitely my advice would be just to get some of that kind of life experience. Essentially, as long as you’ve got the right attitude and the grades to back you up, and you are that driven, that will put you in the best possible position you could be in to be successful. 

Kate: 

Have you got any tips for students who are applying to the grad schemes? Is there anything that you did that you felt helped? You said, you know, the life experience, the character building things can help. But in terms of how you wrote the application, how you approached the assessment centre, is there anything that you would advise people sort of take on board if they are wanting to try and succeed? 

Heather: 

I think definitely the key for me is to do your research on the company. So they ask that you do a store walk, and you go to an Aldi store before you would go to the assessment centre, and you do a little presentation within the group assessment. Essentially, the more research and the more you want the job, the more likely you are to succeed. You’ve got to fight for your position in there and make sure that you’re open to the opportunity, and that you’re really excited about it. I think if you show that passion and that thirst for development and knowledge from the get go, with the kind of research that you found out to back you up, that will come across as if you’re really interested, you’ve done a lot of background work, and you really want the job rather than it just being one of your options. 

Kate: 

Yeah, and I like the tool that you’ve got on your website, where it shows you the different scenarios. It’s like a video and you have to pick what you would do, kind of thing. I think that’s a good tester for people who want to just see if it is the kind of thing that’s for them. But you’re saying as part of the assessment centre, are people told to go and do that walk through the store and look at certain things, or is it something that you’d just say is a good idea to do that? 

Heather: 

Well, definitely when I applied, we were each told to go and do a local store visit, and take some notes, and given a selection of the kind of issues which your presentation might be on. So the way the store was laid out, the till process, how it seems to be kind of working with deliveries from an efficiency perspective. So I’d really kind of cover all bases, and that puts you in the best position, really. But you will be told beforehand that that’s a requirement, but it definitely helps to get some product knowledge as well, and to be visibly excited about the products that we sell and how the business is moving forward. 

Kate: 

Brilliant! Any other sort of top tips that you’d give to people applying, or words that you’d want to share with them? You say you’re mentoring quite a lot of the new trainees on the scheme at the moment. Is there anything that you’ve picked up from them, that they’ve sort of shared – “Ah, I wish I’d know about this”, or “That was a really useful experience that’s coming in handy now”. 

Heather: 

Yeah, so one of the good things is, once area managers have had their final interview with our managing director, they’ll often have a chat with one of the experienced area managers to give them an insight into the role. By all means, it would be a great idea to pop into your local Aldi store, and ask for the local area manager’s details, and then you could just give us a ring. Any of us would happily talk through just what the job really involves, kind of in reality. Obviously there’s a lot of information on the internet, but one of the best things about the job is that no two weeks or no two days really are the same at all, there is so much variety within the role. So I think probably I’d recommend doing that, so you’ve got first-hand kind of experience of what the job involves, to see whether you’re prepared for it, and if it’s something you want to do. 

Kate: 

That’s a really good idea. And I guess that would be great evidence for someone to put into their application, or talk about in an interview as well, to really demonstrate that they are genuinely excited and interested in the organisation. If you’ve gone to that level of effort and been that proactive, it’s a nice way to show your interest and enthusiasm. 

Heather: 

Yeah, absolutely. And it shows confidence as well. Like, it shows drive, and confidence, and independence – I think those are all kind of really respected throughout the process. Ultimately they are looking for leaders of the future, and people that are prepared to give their all to something. You’ve got to have confidence coming into the role, because you can’t kind of shy away from situations, you’ve got to tackle them head on. 

Kate: 

Brilliant! Well, for more information about the careers we’ve mentioned today, I’ll add some relevant links to the show notes and a link to the full transcript of today’s show. I’ll also put some more information about the Aldi scheme and how to apply. But, thank you so much, Heather, for giving up your time today and sort of sharing your experiences with us. I’m sure lots of people will find it really, really helpful. So thank you! 

Heather: 

No problem at all, thank you very much! 

Kate: 

Thank you for joining us this week on ‘What Do You Actually Do?’. This episode was hosted by me, Kate Morris, edited by Stephen Furlong, and produced by both of us. If you love this podcast, spread the word and follow us. Are you eager to get more tips? Follow University of York Careers and Placements on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. All useful links are in this episode’s description? This has been produced at the University of York Careers and Placements. For more information visit york.ac.uk/careers