Rachel joined our Planning team in 2021 as a Retail Capacity Analyst. Within a year, she was promoted to Planning Manager where she now supports a team of Forecasting Analysts and works collaboratively with Capacity Forecasters and Business Partners across the company to support our call scheduling.
Now eight months into her new role, Rachel shares her experience of joining us and how the flexibility at Hastings helps support her work life balance.
An easy transition into Hastings
I started at Hastings nearly two years ago in the Planning team as a Retail Capacity Analyst which was a big move for me after 13 years in my previous company. The team was really welcoming and made the transition easy, and I had the opportunity to develop the role and make it my own.
After a year at Hastings, there were a few changes in the team and a Planning Manager role came up. This was my chance to progress further in my career, so I went for the job and was really pleased when I was successful, especially after being at the company for a short period of time. I’m now eight months in and really starting to find momentum.
Building relationships across the company
As Planning Manager, I work alongside and support a team of Forecasting Analysts who analyse and forecast calls and average handling time for our claims and customer operations areas, so that scheduling teams can plan accordingly. I also work with Capacity Forecasters and Business Partners on short to long term planning and budget planning.
Building relationships across the company to support with forecasting and ad hoc reporting is a big part of my role. The team are starting to forecast for other teams in the company that we’ve not worked with previously, so we need to make sure we work well with these new stakeholders to make the journey for them into the forecasting world a good one.
Supporting my team in their own growth
I enjoy the freedom within the roles I’ve had at Hastings and I’ve been able to develop and grow these roles to something that can really benefit the business and my colleagues. I hope to do this more in my role and continue to support my team in their own growth.
A good work life balance
Hastings is a great company to work for, it is supportive and flexible to the way individuals work and it caters for a good work life balance. Personally, I work from home and do a four-day week with a Wednesday off; this helps me balance work with life admin. There is also progression and support to progress at Hastings, something I haven’t always found at other companies.
My advice for progression
Be proactive and set goals for yourself. If there’s a certain role that you have your eye on, make sure you have a clear path on how you want to achieve this next step. Use resources available to you, such as speaking to your manager or others in your team to help set these goals. If there is a role within another team at Hastings that you’re interested in, reach out to people in that team, speak to them about the role, their experience and even ask to shadow someone to get some hands-on experience. For example, in Planning, we would always be happy to spend time with someone who is interested in a role within our team!
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