Director, People Technology & Workday Architect

Come make your difference in communities across Canada, where authenticity, trust and making connections is valued – as we shape the future of Canadian retail, together. Our unique position as one of the country's largest employers, coupled with our commitment to positively impact the lives of all Canadians, provides our colleagues a range of opportunities and experiences to help Canadians Live Life Well®.

At Loblaw Companies Limited, we succeed through collaboration and commitment and set a high bar for ourselves and those around us. Whether you are just starting your career, re‑entering the workforce, or looking for a new job, this is where you belong.

We are elevating the People Technology function at Loblaw, and this role is central to that evolution. The Director, People Technology & Workday Architect is a hands‑on Workday expert, a strategic thought partner, and a builder of future capability. This individual brings advanced technical mastery across nearly every facet of Workday — from complex calculated fields and condition rules to end‑to‑end configuration across HCM, Payroll, Benefits, Compensation, Talent, Recruiting, Absence, Time Tracking, Security, Integrations, and Reporting.

This director ensures that Workday operates as a stable, scalable, and well‑architected enterprise platform while helping shape the long‑term vision for People Technology at Loblaw. They mentor and develop the team, enabling advanced configuration questions, architectural selections, triaging, and complex design work to be resolved confidently and independently.

This role influences the people experience for 225,000+ team members across Canada by delivering Workday solutions that are intuitive, resilient, enterprise‑aligned, and grounded in best practices.

Please note this colleague will be required to be onsite 4 days a week at our head office in Brampton.

How You’ll Make a Difference

Oversee the Enterprise Workday Architecture

• Serve as a senior Workday architect and contributor, accountable for cohesive design across all modules and functional areas.
• Aid in the development of the Workday product vision and multi‑year roadmap, aligned to organizational priorities, enterprise architecture, and enterprise outcomes.
• Build scalable, user‑centric solutions that reflect best practices, leverage existing tools, and minimize unnecessary customization.
• Apply structured decision‑making frameworks to evaluate solution options and ensure consistency, sustainability, and alignment to future‑state architecture.

Deep Technical Ownership

• Configure (hands‑on) and oversee configuration across all major Workday modules, including complex business processes and configuration frameworks.
• Design and review advanced calculated fields, condition rules, automation frameworks, and cross‑module configuration patterns.
• Assist in developing advanced analytics, dashboards, and reporting frameworks that support organizational insight and decision‑making.
• Ensure system configuration is resilient, well‑documented, consistently governed, and ready for enterprise scale.
• Establish and uphold data governance and data quality standards within the Workday ecosystem, ensuring accuracy, consistency, and integrity of worker, organizational, payroll, and talent data.
• Interpret Workday release notes, assess potential impacts, identify opportunities for adoption, and guide the team through testing, deployment, and communication.
• Support deployment of new Workday modules or product expansions (e.g., Workday Learning) by providing configuration leadership, data readiness oversight, testing guidance, and alignment to enterprise architecture.
• Collaborate closely with Integration teams to ensure integrations follow architectural standards, maintain data quality, and reinforce end‑to‑end business processes across HR, Payroll, and downstream systems.

Coaching, Capability Building & Leadership

• Develop the Workday team into a high‑capability technical centre of excellence capable of independently solving complex configuration challenges.
• Provide hands‑on coaching, quality reviews, and architectural guidance to elevate technical depth and problem‑solving capability across the team.
• Champion a culture of curiosity, continuous learning, inclusion, and design excellence.

Strategic Consultation & Problem‑Solving

• Operate as a trusted advisor to HR, business leaders, Finance, Legal, and IT on Workday capabilities, impacts, and opportunities.
• Evaluate COE requests through an enterprise lens, ensuring choices balance usability, compliance, performance, maintainability, and long‑term scalability.
• Constructively challenge assumptions, propose alternative approaches, and guide stakeholders toward outcomes aligned with enterprise value and long‑term system health.
• Provide multiple solution pathways for business needs, clearly articulating risks, impacts, trade‑offs, and recommendations.

Enterprise Thinking & Experience Design

• Bring a holistic view to how People Technology can reduce friction, save time, optimize cost, and deliver a consistently exceptional colleague and manager experience.
• Identify proactive opportunities to use Workday and related technologies to support broader organizational transformation.
• Ensure solutions reflect end‑to‑end process thinking, not isolated functional views.
• Continuously monitor emerging trends and innovations in People Technology and identify practical opportunities to modernize Loblaw’s HR ecosystem.

What You’ll Bring

Technical Mastery

• 10+ years (or equivalent deep experience) configuring and optimizing Workday across multiple domains (HCM, Compensation, Payroll, Benefits, Absence, Time, Recruiting, Talent, Security, Integrations, Reporting).
• Advanced capability with:
  • Complex calculated fields
  • Condition rules
  • Business process configuration
  • Security architecture
  • Cross‑module configuration patterns
  • Dashboards & analytics
  • Integration oversight and ecosystem design
• Experience with enterprise environments (Retail or Financial Services) is an asset.
• Experience with Workday integration tools (Studio, EIB, PECI, REST/SOAP APIs) is preferred.
• Experience supporting large‑scale, multi‑business‑unit, high‑volume Workday environments is strongly preferred.
• Experience applying data governance principles and ensuring data quality across systems is an asset.

Leadership & Strategic Capability

• Proven experience coaching and developing technically skilled Workday teams.
• A practical and credible leadership presence with the ability to influence senior stakeholders through clarity, reasoning, and collaborative partnership.
• Demonstrated ability to contribute to a Workday roadmap and support platform evolution.

Problem‑Solving & Enterprise Thinking

• Ability to rapidly assess impacts, identify dependencies, and design multiple solution options.
• Strong judgment balancing immediate needs with long‑term system sustainability.
• A thoughtful, inclusive approach to user experience, simplification, and automation.
• Comfort making independent decisions within established architectural principles, with sound judgment on when escalation is needed.

Professional Attributes

• Detailed, precise, and intentional in both design and communication.
• Flexible, grounded, and able to pivot as priorities shift.
• Highly collaborative with excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Natural curiosity and a commitment to elevating the People Technology ecosystem.

Why This Role Matters

This role strengthens the foundation of People Technology at Loblaw by combining deep Workday expertise with strategic enterprise thinking. It ensures that Workday continues to evolve into an intuitive, scalable, and efficient platform — improving the colleague and manager experience while enabling the business to operate with confidence and clarity. The Director plays a key role in shaping our future HR technology landscape and building sustainable capability across the team.

Our commitment to Sustainability and Social Impact is an essential part of the way we do business, and we focus our attention on areas where we can have the greatest impact. Our approach to sustainability and social impact is based on three pillars – Environment, Sourcing and Community – and we are constantly looking for ways to demonstrate leadership in these important areas. Our CORE Values – Care, Ownership, Respect and Excellence – guide all our decision‑making and come to life through our Blue Culture. We offer our colleagues progressive careers, comprehensive training, flexibility, and other competitive benefits – these are some of the many reasons why we are one of Canada’s Top Employers, Canada’s Best Diversity Employers, Canada’s Greenest Employers & Canada’s Top Employers for Young People.

If you are unsure whether your experience matches every requirement above, we encourage you to apply anyway. We are looking for varied perspectives which include diverse experiences that we can add to our team.

We have a long‑standing focus on diversity, equity and inclusion because we know it will make our company a better place to work and shop. We are committed to creating accessible environments for our colleagues, candidates and customers. Requests for accommodation due to a disability (which may be visible or invisible, temporary or permanent) can be made at any stage of application and employment. We encourage candidates to make their accommodation needs known so that we can provide equitable opportunities.

Please Note: Candidates who are 18 years or older are required to complete a criminal background check. Details will be provided through the application process.