Kimberly Baker’s career has grown within Jewel-Osco. A store director, Baker has been with the company long enough to know operations inside and out. “I started with Jewel about seventeen years ago as a drug store management trainee,” she explains. “I progressed through the company, spent two years in store set up and I was promoted to store director and I’ve been store director for about eleven years.”
For Baker, the key to her upward mobility was forging strong ties and finding qualified mentors within Jewel. “I do believe that I was well trained by every manager that I worked with, my career has really been helped by a lot of my mentors in the business,” she says. “The biggest thing I’ve learned is how to deal with various types of people. Relating to [them] and attending to their needs. It’s not just a customer-store director relationship; it’s an associate-store director relationship. You have to be able to adjust to change, keep a level head and make the right decisions.”
It’s been a rewarding experience for Baker, and she loves to pass her extensive knowledge of the company to associates. “[I love] the people that I’ve worked with, the relationships that I’ve formed,” she shares. “As store director, you handle a lot of different things-you’re HR, merchandising, inventory, you get exposed to every facet of the business. In retail, you have an opportunity to do so many different things. I take my job and my position very seriously [and] knowing that there’s somebody I’ve helped today, be it associate or customer, it’s a good day.” -todd williams
