Fanatics Commerce is the global leader in licensed sports merchandise, operating a vertically integrated platform that designs, manufactures, and delivers officially licensed apparel, jerseys, headwear, and collectibles for major leagues, teams, and events worldwide. With more than
900 e-commerce sites and a global omnichannel presence across digital, in-venue, and retail, Fanatics Commerce reaches fans in over 180 countries and powers official fan experiences for many of the world’s most iconic sports properties.
At Fanatics, we bring our BOLD Leadership Principles to life every day—building championship teams, obsessing over fans, acting with entrepreneurial speed, and delivering with a determined and relentless mindset.
As we continue to scale our global platform, the Director(Head of) Performance Management and Talent Development, will play a critical role in building the talent practices that define how Fanatics Commerce identifies, develops, and advances its people for the next phase of global growth. This role owns the performance, succession, and learning & development architecture for Fanatics Commerce globally, sitting within the unified Talent Management COE and partnering closely with the HRBP community to ensure what we build is consistent, scalable, and tied directly to business outcomes.
ROLE OVERVIEW
The Director Performance Management and Talent Development is responsible for designing and building the end-to-end talent development architecture for Fanatics Commerce — owning performance management, succession planning, learning & development, and career frameworks as one integrated system grounded in BOLD.
This is a builder role within a unified Talent Management COE that has consolidated Talent Acquisition and Talent Development under one leader. The Director Performance Management and Talent Development leads the development pillar — designing frameworks that HRBPs deploy across all business units globally. Scale comes through the partnership model and the quality of what you build, not headcount. The role reports to the Vice President and Head of Global Talent Management.
This role requires the ability to:
- Design globally scalable talent practices that work across geographies and employee populations
• Build tools and frameworks that enable HRBPs to deliver talent practices with confidence and consistency
• Apply data, AI-enabled platforms, and talent technology to modernize how we develop and advance people
• Partner with Talent Acquisition to close the loop between bench development and external sourcing — build-vs-buy discipline as a shared metric
Business & Functional Impact
- Deliver measurable results aligned to team, function, and company goals
• Translate strategy into execution that drives business outcomes
• Identify and act on opportunities to improve performance, efficiency, or growth
HOW YOU WILL DRIVE IMPACT
Success is measured by the ability to deliver results through BOLD capabilities and measurable outcomes.
Team & Leadership Impact (Build Championship Teams)
• Lead a lean team with a high-leverage operating model; protect strategic bandwidth by partnering with the BPO model for administrative and coordination work
• Build HRBP capability as the primary delivery mechanism — design for the person who must deploy what you build; the playbook they can use is the measure of success
• Develop talent on your team and hold a high standard — the team that owns talent development should model what great looks like
Employee & Team Impact (Obsessed with Fans)
• Design performance and development frameworks from the employee experience backward — not from HR process forward; keep the end user in view at every design decision
• Use talent data and workforce insights to inform development investment decisions and measure the ROI of learning, succession, and performance programs
• Ensure every program — from onboarding through succession — reflects a people-first mindset; the employee experience is the product
Innovation & Problem Solving (Entrepreneurial Spirit)
• Build talent practices with BOLD principles in mind —succession planning, performance calibration, and L&D architecture designed for how Fanatics Commerce works, not how HR textbooks say it should
• Evaluate and adopt next-generation development platforms to modernize the learning ecosystem and introduce AI-enabled development pathways
• Move fast in an ambiguous environment — frameworks that are good and deployed beat perfect frameworks that aren’t; iterate with urgency and discipline
Ownership & Execution (Determined & Relentless Mindset)
• Own the full talent development lifecycle without waiting for direction — performance, succession, L&D, and career frameworks are your domain; bring the point of view and lead the work
• Navigate complexity, competing priorities, and a lean team structure without losing standard or momentum; deliver through ambiguity as a baseline expectation
• Hold the bar on BOLD standards across every program you build — performance calibration, succession slates, and development programs all reflect the same high standard, consistently
AI & DIGITAL CAPABILITY
We are building a future-ready organization. This role is expected to:
• Apply AI and technology to improve efficiency, quality, and outcomes
• Use data and digital tools to inform decisions and enhance performance
• Demonstrate curiosity and adaptability in adopting new technologies and ways of working
• Contribute to a culture of innovation and continuous improvement
CAPABILITIES & EXPERIENCE YOU BRING
- 10+ years of progressive HR experience with direct ownership of talent development, performance management, succession planning, and/or L&D — as a designer and builder of systems, not just an operator of them.
• 7+ years of team leadership experience.
• Proven track record building or significantly rebuilding talent frameworks in complex, matrixed, or high-growth organizations — you have created things that didn’t exist before.
• COE operating model experience — you understand the difference between owning execution and enabling it through an HRBP community, and you build for the person who must deploy what you design.
• Experience designing globally scalable talent practices that work across geographies and employee populations without requiring a different program for every market
• Applied experience with modern learning and talent technology (LMS, performance platforms, assessment tools); genuine curiosity about AI-enabled development and how it is reshaping L&D and succession practice.
At Fanatics, we operate with a BOLD mindset—We Build Championship Teams, we’re Obsessed with Fans, we embrace a Limitless Entrepreneurial Spirit, and we approach every challenge with a Determined and Relentless Mindset. If you’re ready to contribute to a dynamic, fast-paced environment that thrives on collaboration and growth, we want you to be part of our team
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