Role Overview
As the Merchandising System Lead, you will serve as the bridge between the Merchandising department and the IT Department. Reporting directly to the Senior Merchandising Manager (Product Owner), you will be the dedicated business-side expert responsible for ensuring that our core merchandising platforms, inventory processing workflows, and future digital initiatives are designed, tested, and implemented in line with the desired outcome.
This is an analytical and execution-focused role. You will take high-level business visions and translate them into crystal-clear functional requirements for IT Business Analysts, while concurrently leading the end-to-end User Acceptance Testing (UAT) process to safeguard operational integrity.
Key Responsibilities
1. Requirements Engineering & Business Analysis
- Partner closely with the Senior Merchandising Manager to extract, define, and document business requirements for new features, system enhancements, and applications.
- Serve as the primary business counterpart to IT Business Analysts; translate backend operational needs into functional user stories, data mapping rules, and clear acceptance criteria.
- Map and optimize end-to-end merchandising workflows.
2. Comprehensive UAT Management & Quality Assurance
- Own the end-to-end User Acceptance Testing (UAT) lifecycle for all systems owned by Merchandising.
- Develop rigorous test scenarios and test cases directly tied to the original requirements including volume stress testing to ensure system stability and performance during peak processing and mass data updates.
- Coordinate and mobilize business end-users to execute UAT, ensuring testing is conducted comprehensively across all edge cases.
- Validate, triage, and log system defects, collaborating closely with IT to determine whether issues are software bugs or gaps in initial business logic.
- Provide final UAT readiness recommendations to the Senior Merchandising Manager for deployment sign-off.
3. System Maintenance & Operational Readiness
- Review and evaluate incoming system change requests from the merchandising team by assessing their operational feasibility, business impact, and priority before formal escalation to IT.
- Create and update internal business user guides, system documentation, and release notes; lead training sessions to ensure smooth, compliant adoption of new features and system updates.
Requirements
- 3-6 years of experience operating as a Business Analyst, Product Analyst, or Systems Specialist, ideally sitting within IT department, a retail corporate or digital commerce business unit.
- Proven track record of owning or heavily executing UAT cycles, writing detailed test cases, and understanding data mapping/functional logic.
- Prior experience in retail merchandising, inventory management, or luxury goods operations is highly advantageous.
- Familiarity with ERP inventory modules, Product Information Management systems, or specialized master data management platforms.
