See your career at Specsavers: From retail to technology, Len Jenning’s career story 

Len first joined Specsavers as an optical assistant in our Chichester store purely because he’d run out of savings and needed a job, little did he know that 15 years later he’d still be here (with one detour along the way)! Read on to find out all about Len’s career journey so far and what bought him back to Specsavers.    

Len worked retail side for several years working his way up through various stores. During this time, he completed his dispensing optician qualification to become a Dispensing Optician, and his ILM Leadership & Management course. Throughout his optical career he’s also worked for Vision Express to understand and gain experience with a different optical retailer in a managerial capacity.  

Deep down he knew he would always make the move back to Specsavers, and in 2013 he did just that and joined the managerial team in the Bognor Regis store. He stayed in this role for three years, until he moved to his final retail role as Store Manager in the Chichester store (which was the first store he’d ever worked in).  

After working in retail for nearly 13 years Len was ready for a change, so when he spotted an article on our internal communications platform that said, ‘Are you interested in the future of IT and do you have store knowledge?’ he clicked through to read more and saw it was an article advertising for a Trainee Business Analyst role in our Whiteley support office. This is exactly the sort of role Len felt ready for, he always had a passion for Technology and wanted to put his store knowledge to good use.  

Len successfully joined the technology team in Whiteley as a Business Analyst for Dispensing and Collection in November 2019, where he was supported by Specsavers to complete a Business Analyst course and became the process journey specialist for our instore systems.  

Unfortunately, when the pandemic hit in March 2020 Len’s role was made redundant. He wasn’t gone for long though – as soon as the business started to see signs of recovery the team reached out to Len and he joined us as the Service Desk Training Team Leader overseeing the training of all our new starters in the Service Desk team.  

After 12 months in this role Len was presented with his next opportunity and now works as our Technology Customer Services Improvement and Knowledge Manager (CSI & Knowledge), In this role Len looks at ways of improving our service to store so that when a store calls us with an IT issue we are prepared and can fix their issues as smoothly and quickly as possible.  

We asked Len why he loves working for Specsavers and he said:  

‘The reason I work for Specsavers and that I’ve come back time and time again is because it is a great company to work for, it’s got that family business vibe, everyone supports you, even from working in store to support office – we are all part of the same team. It’s also a career where you do really make an impact – I used to see it all the time in store, a little kid would come in and put on glasses and be able to see clearly for the first time and it’s just amazing – we really do make a difference to people’s lives. No matter what role you work in at Specsavers we all have a part to play in helping people’s health.’  

When we asked Len to describe the Specsavers culture in one word, he used ‘opportunities’. It’s clear to see that Len has had so many different opportunities at Specsavers and that’s what keeps him coming back.  

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