Mgr, Franchise Dev Strategy & Enablement at CJ Foodville USA Inc – Buena Park, California

Manager, Franchise Development Strategy & Enablement

Job Type: Full-Time Employee, Exempt
Level: Manager or Senior Manager (commensurate with experience)

Department: Business Development – Real Estate
Location: Los Angeles, CA Corporate Office (preferred)
Travel: Occasional travel to regional offices, conferences, franchisee meetings, and market tours
Reports to: Senior Director of Real Estate, with dotted-line accountability to the Chief Development Officer

SUMMARY
This role is critical to CJ Foodville’s continued national expansion of Tous les Jours Bakery Café. The Manager, Franchise Development Strategy & Enablement supports disciplined, scalable growth by building and maintaining the franchise development infrastructure across franchise sales, real estate, design and construction.

The role partners closely with development leadership to provide visibility, structure, and insights that support informed decision-making and execution of growth strategies. Serving as a central organizing force, this position enables best-in-class franchise recruitment, data-driven site selection, coordinated development pacing, and more predictable store openings across both franchise and company-owned markets.

This is a highly collaborative, enablement-focused role designed for a strong generalist who thrives on organization, process, and cross-functional coordination rather than deep technical ownership of any single discipline.

JOB DESCRIPTION

Reporting to the Senior Director of Real Estate, the Manager, Franchise Development Strategy & Enablement, serves as a central coordinating and enablement partner across franchise sales, real estate, and design and construction. The role supports the execution of national growth strategies by organizing inputs, timelines, and priorities across teams to ensure alignment with approved market plans, development objectives, and brand standards. This role is directly involved in bringing together market plans, pipeline data, and execution inputs into cohesive, leadership-ready frameworks that support decision-making, pacing, and predictability.

The Manager, Franchise Development Strategy & Enablement provides the structure, tools, and visibility needed for leadership to manage growth at scale, anticipate risks, and drive cross-functional accountability. Acting as connective tissue across teams, the role helps ensure franchise sales activity, real estate readiness, and construction sequencing are coordinated and executable as the brand expands nationally.

DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES

Franchise Development Strategy & Enablement
• Support leadership in executing national and regional franchise development strategies by organizing data, timelines, and priorities across functions.
• Partner with Franchise Sales, Real Estate, and Design & Construction to ensure coordinated execution from franchise award through store opening.
• Serve as a central point of coordination to help identify gaps, risks, and misalignment across the development lifecycle.

Market Planning & Pipeline Management
• Coordinate and consolidate market planning inputs from Regional Real Estate Managers, ensuring approved strategies, assumptions, and priorities are clearly documented and reflected in development systems.

• Translate market plans into leadership-ready views by integrating franchise sales activity, real estate pipelines, and construction sequencing to support disciplined development pacing.

• Maintain the development pipeline as the single source of truth by aggregating updates, tracking dependencies and risks, and escalating issues to leadership as needed.

Leadership Support & Reporting
• Prepare executive dashboards, reports, and presentations related to franchise sales progress, deal status, construction readiness, opening forecasts, and risk flags.
• Support weekly and monthly pipeline, real estate, and construction meetings by preparing materials, tracking action items, and facilitating follow-up.
• Provide leadership with clear, concise insights to support decision-making at the executive and committee level.

Process, Systems & Infrastructure
• Design, document, and continuously improve franchise development processes, workflows, and approval frameworks.
• Maintain standard templates and tools, including LOI packages, site summaries, approval decks, and committee materials.
• Support adoption and ongoing use of real estate and development systems.

Cross-Functional & Franchisee Support
• Support franchisee onboarding from a development perspective by clearly communicating processes, timelines, and required inputs.
• Coordinate with Operations, Brand, and Construction teams to support store opening readiness and sequencing.
• Assist Regional Real Estate Managers and other team members on an as-needed basis with deal analysis, broker coordination, and preparation for negotiations or presentations.

Special Projects
• Support national market planning initiatives, leadership priorities, and special projects as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE

Education
• Bachelor’s degree in business administration, real estate, urban planning, finance, analytics, or a related field required.

Experience
• 5+ years of experience in retail or restaurant development, real estate, franchise operations, strategy, analytics, or portfolio planning.
• Experience supporting multi-unit expansion in a franchise and/or corporate environment.
• Exposure to franchise sales, real estate, or construction workflows strongly preferred; expertise in all areas not required.

Skills & Attributes
• Highly organized, detail-oriented, and process-driven, with a strong ability to manage pipelines, dashboards, and cross-functional workflows.
• Strong collaborator who can support leadership and multiple teams without direct authority.
• Comfortable operating in a fast-paced, scaling environment with evolving priorities.
• Strong written, visual, and verbal communication skills, including executive-ready summaries and presentations.
• Analytical mindset with the ability to synthesize information and flag risks or dependencies.

Technical & Systems Experience
• Experience with real estate, development, CRM, or portfolio management systems preferred.
• Familiarity with GIS platforms (e.g., Sitewise or similar) a plus.
• Strong proficiency in Excel, PowerPoint, and reporting tools.