Katya Budden, our Head of Business Systems here at Retail247, is often juggling many clients and projects in her role. She has written a blog post about a typical day in her life, giving us an understanding of what goes into being an established retail consultant.
6:30am
Anyone that knows me knows I am not a morning person! This means I like to get up fairly early and take my time getting ready for the day ahead. When I’m in the office that means leaving around 7:30 to get in and have my porridge, and if I’m at home it means I have time to do some odd jobs before the day starts, and of course my first cup of tea to get my brain into gear.
8:00am
I tend to start early so that I can catch up before the rest of the world is online without Teams pinging every 5 seconds. Working for multiple clients at once means I am always in demand!
I use this time to go through emails, write my to do list for the day, check what meetings I have and ensure I am fully prepped. This is also the time when I have my second cup of tea!
9:00am
Many of my clients work in an agile manner so I attend daily stand ups with the teams in order to know what has progressed the previous day, what will be worked on that day and anything that is blocking this work. We also use this time to review any current issues or concerns and to discuss anything that is about to be released for testing. It is always great to celebrate anything that has gone live the previous day – I enjoy starting my day as a retail consultant on a positive note.
10:00am
A big (and I mean big) part of my job is drawing up process flows. I am extremely visual and find the world just makes more sense when it is in the form of a diagram. I find them to be the most useful tool when working with other areas of a business to explain any technical and business changes and how this will impact them. With that in mind, Visio is my best friend (most of the time) and I spend a lot of time tweaking arrows, moving boxes and generally making the world a prettier place. My process flows aren’t necessarily ‘by the book’ but experience has taught me that the best diagrams are the ones that make sense to the people using them, therefore that is what I always keep in mind when producing anything.
Just some examples of the types of process flows I have to produce:
- Working with clients to provide a full business end to end flow which is always exciting. These start out as absolute chaos but the moment when it just slots together is super satisfying.
- Specific business areas as initial analysis for our PIM solution, Origin. This is where I review their current product creation process and then map out how this will change once Origin is implemented.
- AS-IS and TO-BE business process flows for all projects that I am part of. These may be single processes or multiple that have linked dependencies (these vary depending on the project).
11:00am
I usually have output from meetings or emails to follow up on, so I use a period of time throughout the day to action anything urgent that has come through from the morning and add anything else to my to do list for later in the day or week. I’m usually on cup of tea number 3 around about now.
12:00pm
Lunch time (usually bang on 12 as I’m always hungry!). I have the very bad habit of eating at my desk, but I use this time to work through any emails that have not yet received my attention. Some days can be crazy with meetings, so I have occasionally had to eat during a meeting (always off camera for those, no one needs to see me trying to subtly shove a sandwich in my face) but thankfully that is rare!
1:00pm
2 hours of meetings – that would be the dream! As a retail consultant I can have up to 6 hours worth of meetings or workshops during a day, meaning I have to set time aside for the rest of the work I need to do. I usually block out times in my diary so that I can get specific tasks done and to ensure that no one books a meeting. It can be difficult to manage my time when I have a busy week meeting wise so I do have to be organised and ensure I have all my work prioritised based on the deadlines for each project.
3:00pm
More stand ups! Working with so many suppliers means that multiple stand ups are required, usually on a daily basis. Copious cups of tea have been drunk by now!
3:30pm
Any other retail consultant business!
Other tasks include:
- Working on our internal products, Origin and Quantum where we have multiple ongoing projects, some of which I manage. Regardless, I like to be as up to date as possible with the products and the roadmaps
- AS-IS / TO-BE analysis
- Writing up meeting minutes
- Prepare for / run workshops
- Building data flows
- Data analysis to form part of a proposal for a change or where a business decision is required
- Catching up with members of the team, this is an important part of the day as working remotely can mean you work in your own bubble, so regular check ins are a definite must have for me.
5:30pm (ish)
Now it’s time to sign off for the day. I usually double check what I have in my diary for the next day to ensure I have everything ready. Working from home can make it hard to switch off so I make a point of turning off the laptop and shutting the office door (of course that doesn’t stop me checking the odd email on my phone). Ideally when leaving the office I get a seat on the tube so I can immerse myself in a book for 30 mins to really switch off after a busy day. Thanks for joining me!