Director, Interiors

Job description

### The role We are looking to hire a Director, Interiors to join our Content team in London, UK. This is an on-site role out of our London office. ### Working at WGSN ### Together, we create tomorrow A career with WGSN is fast-paced, exciting and full of opportunities to grow and develop. We're a team of consumer and design trend forecasters, content creators, designers, data analysts, advisory consultants and much more, united by a common goal: to create tomorrow. WGSN's trusted consumer and design forecasts power outstanding product design, enabling our customers to create a better future. Our services cover consumer insights, beauty, consumer tech, fashion, interiors, lifestyle, food and drink forecasting, data analytics and expert advisory. If you are an expert in your field, we want to hear from you. ### Role overview As Director of Interiors, you will be responsible for defining and driving WGSN's global interiors content forecasting strategy, ensuring we remain the leading authority on the future of home, interiors and hospitality. This is a high-profile leadership role focused on identifying lifestyle, consumer, and design shifts shaping interiors across short, medium and long-term forecasting horizons. You will connect macro trends, design trends, innovation and consumer behaviour to create commercially actionable forecasts that help clients anticipate future opportunities and make better product, design and business decisions. Your primary job is to strengthen WGSN's authority and thought leadership on interiors, using our proprietary forecasting methodologies to expand the relevance, quality and accuracy of our forecasting across these sectors globally. ### Key accountabilities #### Forecasting & Content Strategy - Set the strategic direction for WGSN's global interiors forecasting and content portfolio. - Create and lead the development of trend forecasts, design directions and future-facing insight using industry expertise, creative knowledge with data-backed evidence. - Identify emerging shifts in consumer lifestyles, aesthetics, materials, sustainability and technology that will influence the industry and translate them into actionable strategies for our clients and businesses. - Identify and maintain interior trends for WGSN's always-on forecasting ecosystem, ensuring trends and assets are connected, reusable and continuously updated. - Ensure a consistent and cohesive WGSN narrative is embedded across all interiors categories, for all regions and the wider forecasting WGSN ecosystem. - Inform, take part in and translate the WGSN Macro Forecast suite and forecasts through an interiors and lifestyle lensClient connection is paramount to this role - work closely with the sales teams across regions to keep the pulse of the markets, understand challenges and pain points, and help strengthen relationships; - this will be central to inform the content strategy, both closer to season and further out #### Content Excellence - Oversee the creation of industry-leading content, forecasts, webinars and thought leadership. - Drive innovation in forecasting frameworks and methodologies and lead implementation of new platforms and tools, including the application of AI, data analytics and emerging technologies. - Partner with regional and cross-functional content and commercial teams to ensure consistency, quality and commercial relevance.Act as a key spokesperson for WGSN, representing the business at industry events, media engagements and client presentations. #### Leadership & Team Development - Lead and develop WGSN's Interiors team, creating a culture of curiosity, innovation and forecasting excellence. - Establish clear priorities, development pathways and performance standards in partnership with the Head of department. - Lead performance management, implementation of KPIs, and business goals. - Foster collaboration across content, commercial teams and wider business partners. - Champion new approaches to forecasting and ways of working that drive accuracy and excellence. This list is not exhaustive and there may be other activities you are required to deliver. ### Skills, experience & qualifications required - Extensive experience in forecasting, foresight, consumer insight, innovation strategy or a related future-focused discipline. - Extensive expertise and understanding of the interiors sector, design strategy, product development or creative direction. - Deep understanding of the commercial, consumer and cultural forces shaping the future of interiors and related industries. - Proven ability to translate trends into commercially valuable insights, strategies and recommendations. - Experience leading teams, developing talent and setting strategic content direction. - Demonstrated ability to operate across short-, medium- and long-term forecasting horizons. - A background in the industry - such as roles in buying, design development, trend lead - will be valuable to ensure the understanding of how trends impact retailers and brands across teams, price points and end consumers. #### Key Skills - Forecaster first: able to connect category expertise to broader macro drivers and future consumer shifts, translating change into commercially relevant opportunities. - Data-informed forecasting: comfortable combining quantitative analysis, qualitative research and primary signals to develop evidence-based forecasts. - Macro thinking: able to connect broader societal, technological, environmental and cultural shifts to category-specific opportunities. - Collaborative forecasting: able to work across disciplines, regions and specialisms to create stronger, more connected forecasts. - Evidence-led approach: able to substantiate forecasts through a combination of data, research, primary sources and industry expertise. - Hi + Ai: confident leveraging AI, data tools and emerging technologies while applying human judgement, creativity and expertise. - Critical thinking: able to challenge assumptions, assess risk and opportunity, and build rigorous, defensible forecasts.Commercial acumen: translates complex trends into actionable strategies for clients. - Client Facing and public speaking: confident presenting insights and recommendations to senior stakeholders, clients and global audiences. ### What we offer Our benefits and wellbeing package offers flexible benefits you can tailor to your own personal needs, including: - 25 days of holiday per year - with an option to buy/ sell up to 5 days - Pension, Life Assurance and Income Protection Flexible benefits platform with options including Private Medical, Dental Insurance & Critical Illness - Employee assistance programme, season ticket loans and cycle to work scheme - Volunteering opportunities and charitable giving options - Great learning and development opportunities. ### More about WGSN WGSN is the global authority on consumer trend forecasting. We help brands around the world create the right products at the right time for tomorrow’s consumer. ### Our values **We Are Everywhere** The future is everything, it happens everywhere. WGSN is the world-leading forecaster because we track and analyse consumer behaviours, product innovation, design and creativity, [everywhere.](http://everywhere.we/) **We Are Future Focused** We utilise our global resources and intelligence to research, source and analyse quantitative and qualitative data to produce our forecasts. Everything we do is focused on working with our customers to create a successful and positive tomorrow. **We Are Rigorous** We source, review and assess quantitative and qualitative data to produce robust, actionable forecasts. To provide credible insights and design solutions for our clients, it is essential that rigour runs through everything we do. ### Our culture An inclusive culture is one of our key priorities. We want our people to truly be themselves and thrive. We love having a diverse team of people who bring new ideas, different strengths and perspectives & reflect the global audience we work with. ### Inclusive workforce We are committed to supporting the environment and sustainability, including ensuring our pension plan defaults to sustainable options and striving to be net zero by 2030. Recognising great performance is a key part of our culture. Our Awards schemes recognise and reward the brilliant achievements of our people. We offer a flexible working environment with a wide range of flexible, hybrid and agile working arrangements. Conversations about flexible working have always been—and will continue to be—actively encouraged here, but we do not offer full remote working. We want to ensure everyone has the opportunity to perform their best when interviewing, so if you require any reasonable adjustments that would make you more comfortable during the process, please let us know so that we can do our best to support you. **A Note for Applicants** We use AI to help our team screen applications and identify candidates whose skills and experience match the role. This technology removes personal information to promote a fair and unbiased process. We believe this tool helps us find the best talent while maintaining transparency and fairness. **A Note for Recruiters** Thank you so much for your interest in working with us at WGSN! Our internal Talent Acquisition team takes care of all our recruitment efforts. When we need some extra help, we partner with agencies on our Preferred Supplier List (PSL) that truly understand our business, culture and ways of working together. Since we focus on these established partnerships, we’re unable to respond to unsolicited contacts or CVs from outside our PSL. But don’t worry! If we decide to explore new partnerships, we’ll be sure to reach out.