Employment Type

Permanent

Closing Date

13 Mar 2026 11:59pm

Job Title

Design Specialist

Job Summary

Job Description

Focus of the Role

The Retail Design Specialist is responsible for delivering innovative, customer‑centric retail store experiences that strengthen emotional connection with customers and drive uplift in NPS, sales performance and overall in‑store experience.

This role blends creativity with commercial acumen, applying architectural, interior and industrial design capability to shape holistic store environments, fixtures, materials and visual elements.

You will play a key role in bringing to life the future of Retail through thoughtful, practical and cost‑effective design solutions that reflect Telstra’s brand, operational needs, and future customer expectations.

A taste of what the role entails

The role’s primary purpose is to create and deliver premium retail store designs that enhance customer experience and Telstra Retail’s performance.

The Retail Design Specialist collaborates across multiple design disciplines and with a broad range of internal stakeholders, including Retail Operations, Marketing & Brand, Space Planning, Retail Product & Merchandising, and Retail Technology, as well as external partners such as vendors, construction, engineering, and design firms.

The role balances creative thinking with disciplined execution to ensure feasibility, commercial viability, and alignment with business objectives. It also supports business transformation through best-practice design and continuous improvement of customer-led retail environments.

Your key responsibilities include:

Retail Design Expertise & Technical Delivery

• Emphasises the need for a retail subject matter expert who deeply understands how retail environments operate end to end.
• Apply advanced architectural, interior, and industrial design skills to create holistic, functional and future ready retail environments.
• Produce high quality design artefacts - drawings, models, visualisations and presentations - that translate strategy, customer insights and operational needs into practical store solutions.
• Use your deep understanding of the retail ecosystem (customer journeys, operations, technology, merchandising, product flows, and store team behaviour) to design spaces that uplift experience, drive commercial outcomes, and enhance operational efficiency.
• Ensure designs reflect both creativity and pragmatic retail realities (buildability, compliance, cost, durability, maintenance, safety and operational impact).
• Leverage industry standard tools (SketchUp, AutoCAD, Revit, etc.) to deliver technical accuracy and design intent at all stages.

Project Management

• Captures the structured delivery responsibilities aligned to a retail transformation roadmap.
• Manage multiple design projects concurrently, balancing short-term priorities and long term retail transformation goals.
• Apply project management methodologies (Agile, Waterfall) to scope, schedule, track and deliver work within agreed timelines and budgets.
• Develop and manage project estimates, budgets and resource plans, ensuring informed decisions on vendors, tools, consultants and internal capability.
• Provide regular reporting on project progress, risks, issues and budget variance to key stakeholders.

Cross Functional Collaboration & Stakeholder Partnership

• Reflects the central role this position plays in shaping store experiences across the broader business.
• Collaborate with Retail Operations, Retail Marketing & Brand, Retail Product, Merchandising, Space Planning and Retail Technology teams to align design outcomes with business strategy, customer needs and operational practicality.
• Partner with external design, engineering and construction experts to ensure feasibility, safety, cost effectiveness and consistent execution.
• Influence decision making across diverse stakeholder groups - often without formal authority - by presenting clear rationale, evidence and design thinking.
• Facilitate alignment across business units by communicating design solutions that balance customer, commercial and operational considerations.

Continuous Improvement & Design Innovation

• Focuses on using design expertise to lift performance and modernise the retail network.
• Continuously analyse opportunities to streamline processes, automate tasks and standardise tools to improve efficiency, quality and speed to market.
• Seek out and integrate global retail design best practices, sustainability principles, new materials and emerging technologies to elevate the customer and team experience.
• Leverage learnings from past projects to strengthen design methods, design guidelines and delivery models.
• Push innovation through experimentation, prototyping and continuous refinement of design concepts and delivery approaches.

Retail Transformation & Business Impact

• Highlights the expectation that the role contributes directly to retail evolution.
• Translate business problems, changing priorities and customer expectations into design-led solutions that transform stores at scale.
• Ensure all design decisions support measurable improvements in NPS, sales performance, operational outcomes and cost to serve.
• Operate confidently in a volatile, frequently changing retail environment, adjusting design approach and delivery methods as business needs shift.
• Lead end‑to‑end design delivery for store projects, applying architecture, interior and industrial design skills to produce holistic retail environments, fixtures, materials and graphics.
• Manage multiple design projects simultaneously, prioritising effectively to meet key milestones and deadlines in a fast‑changing environment.
• Create high‑quality visualisations, technical drawings and presentations to communicate design intent to stakeholders, store teams and senior leaders.
• Collaborate closely with internal teams across Retail Operations, Retail Marketing, Brand, Product and Merchandising, Space Planning and Retail Technology to align on scope, business requirements, customer needs and delivery approach.
• Partner with external consultants — including construction, engineering and design vendors — to ensure feasibility, cost‑effectiveness and compliance with project standards.
• Apply project management methodologies (Agile, Waterfall) to plan, track and deliver design work, budgets, schedules and resources.
• Prepare and present status reports, insights and variance analysis on design progress, scope changes and financial impacts.
• Use analytical thinking to identify opportunities to improve systems, design processes and ways of working — including automation, simplification and standardisation.
• Incorporate lessons learned, design best practice and global benchmarks to lift design quality and support continuous improvement.
• Influence stakeholders at all levels, often without formal authority, to drive alignment and secure buy‑in on design direction and project decisions

To be successful in this role, you must have the following skills and experience:
 

• Tertiary qualification in a relevant design discipline, such as Architecture, Interior Design or Industrial Design.
• Demonstrated proficiency in industry‑standard design tools, including SketchUp, AutoCAD, Revit and other 3D modelling or technical drawing platforms.
• Experience working within retail design, store development or construction environments is strongly preferred.
• Project management capability and familiarity with Agile and Waterfall methodologies (formal certification desirable but not essential).
• Understanding of construction processes, retail build considerations and operational design requirements.

If you are looking to take the next step in your career, we want to hear from you!

As part of your application with Telstra, you may receive communications from us on +61 440 135 548 (for job applications in Australia) and +1 (623) 400-7726 (for job applications in the Philippines and India).

When you join our team, you become part of a welcoming and inclusive community where everyone is respected, valued and celebrated. We actively seek individuals from various backgrounds, ethnicities, genders and disabilities because we know that diversity not only strengthens our team but also enriches our work. We have zero tolerance for harassment of any kind, and we prioritise creating a workplace culture where everyone is safe and can thrive. 

As part of the hiring process, all identified candidates will undergo a background check, and the results will play a role in the final decision regarding your application.

We work flexibly at Telstra. Talk to us about what flexibility means to you. When you apply, you can share your pronouns and / or any reasonable adjustments needed to take part equitably during the recruitment process.

We are aware of current limitations with our website accessibility and are working towards improving this. Should you experience any issues accessing information or the application form, and require this in an alternate format, please contact our Talent Acquisition team on [email protected] or via the additional contact options found at www.telstra.com.au/careers/diversity-equity-and-inclusion/disability-employment