Sr Director, Catalyze - Bengaluru

About Lowe’s

Lowe's Companies, Inc. (NYSE: LOW) is a FORTUNE® 50 home improvement company serving approximately 17 million customer transactions a week in the U.S. With total fiscal year 2022 sales of over $97 billion, approximately $92 billion of sales were generated in the U.S., where Lowe's operates over 1,700 home improvement stores and employs approximately 300,000 associates. Based in Mooresville, N.C., Lowe's supports the communities it serves through programs focused on creating safe, affordable housing and helping to develop the next generation of skilled trade experts.  For more information, visit Lowes.com.

About Lowe’s India: At Lowe's India, we are the enablers who help create an engaging customer experience for our $97 billion home improvement business at Lowe's. Our 4000+ associates work across technology, analytics, business operations, finance & accounting, product management, and shared services. We leverage new technologies and find innovative methods to ensure that Lowe's has a competitive edge in the market.  To know more about Lowe's India, visit Lowes.co.in

Job Summary 
This role is responsible for: building relationships and initiatives within India’s startup technology ecosystem; developing programs that foster an culture of innovation throughout Lowe’s India; and managing the development of innovation concepts that positively transform our customers’ and associates’ lives – now and in the future. This role is highly visible and strategic: as Sr Director, this individual will interact regularly with senior company leadership and the Indian technology ecosystem.
This role will preside over the Lowe’s India partnership within the Indian market and will catalyze a new program of activity that will generate meaningful partnerships, innovation concepts and a strong innovation brand for the broader company. In the initial months, the Sr Director will be expected to develop an operating model, strategic framework, processes and Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) that will guide this effort. This role reports to the VP, Technology India

Key Responsibilities
• Develops our Indian ecosystem strategy, our portfolio of external/internal outreach programs and a portfolio of innovation concepts, all the while ensuring alignment with core enterprise and innovation stakeholders in India
• Create internal and external strategy for Catalyze.
• Create go to market and monetization constructs and strategy for startups partnering with Lowe’s.
• Requires external and internal depth
• Requires seniority and maturity to drive key innovations partnerships for Lowe's India
• Engages with and evaluates ecosystem partners by drawing upon a deep, systems-level understanding of the emerging technology areas most impacting retail, including but not limited to artificial intelligence, advanced visualization (AR/VR/3D), supply chain automation and advanced manufacturing
• Networks with India’s best and brightest in the Indian ecosystem, continues to build our network of relevant partners, ranging from entrepreneurs to academics to Fortune 500 corporations to regional technology media outlets
• Navigates a large corporate environment, securing alignment and buy-in with senior leadership for strategic plans, budgets and programs
• Makes data-driven decisions by synthesizing diverse data sources and translating them into coherent, actionable strategies
• Manages personal development for the team in Bangalore
• Manages a budget, identifying opportunities for growth, and articulating and sizing said opportunities
• Possesses a strong understanding of process development and management; develops processes that reliably generate high impact ideas and/or bring order to situations rich in ambiguity
• Tells the Lowe’s innovation story internally and externally in breakthrough ways
• Works directly with startups to generate and refine highly impactful innovation concepts
• Stands up and oversees accelerator/incubator programming
• Builds and manages relationships with key stakeholders

Technical or Other Competencies
Negotiating - Knowledge of effective negotiation concepts and techniques; ability to negotiate successfully across the organization and with external vendors and clients in a constructive and collaborative manner.
Capacity Planning & Management - Knowledge of the tools and practices for determining and managing resources (hardware, software, telecommunications, etc.); ability to plan and manage the capacity to provide satisfactory levels of service for current and future applications.

Storytelling - Knowledge of concepts and ability to plan, create and present business proposals, initiatives and ideas by ‘storytelling’ actual business scenarios that are situation-specific, engaging, memorable and persuasive as compared to one-way, fact-based presentations.

Emerging Technologies - Knowledge of and ability to identify, evaluate and appropriately leverage new and evolving technologies to drive innovation and deliver a competitive advantage; includes knowledge of and ability to navigate the various stages of emerging technologies (i.e., hypothesizing, R&D, prototyping, commercialization).
Business Case Development - The ability to develop effective, data-driven business cases that capture both quantitative and qualitative characteristics of a proposed project or initiative.

Lowe's is an equal opportunity employer and administers all personnel practices without regard to race, color, religious creed, sex, gender, age, ancestry, national origin, mental or physical disability or medical condition, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, military or veteran status, genetic information, or any other category protected under federal, state, or local law.