Senior Manager, Design

Who We Are 

Nando’s Peri Peri USA is growing fast and we’re looking for a Senior Design Manager to help bring our new restaurants to life and to drive our renovation projects across the fleet, ensuring that all locations meet or exceed our brand standards. We bring marinated, flame-grilled chicken and PERi PERi joy to guests every day. We move quickly, care about craft, and back our restaurants with the tools they need to succeed, smart commercial thinking and operational empathy. 

 

Nando’s Vision 

At Nando’s, we want to be the most loved restaurant brand in North America, sharing the spirit of Nando’s PERi-PERi with everyone who chooses to access it. We will redesign and build a business that thrives as it answers fully to its consumers’ needs—and endures over time through genuinely putting people at the heart of what we do. We will lead with our values and act with care, compassion, and kindness. By doing this, we will Change Lives Together, every day and everywhere. 

 

Role Summary 

The Senior Manager, Design leads the crossfunctional design program for Nando’s restaurant portfolio, ensuring every new restaurant opening (NRO), renovation, and brand-led refresh meets our aesthetic, operational, and commercial standards. This role owns the design governance framework, sets the multiyear physical environment roadmap, leads internal and external design partners, and ensures design excellence across all pipeline types. 

 

The Senior Manager, Design shapes the design strategy and standards of the built environment, anticipates risks across markets, manages programlevel design budgets, and ensures crossfunctional teams (Development, Construction, Operations, Procurement, Facilities, Brand) are aligned on priorities, sequencing, workflows, and required deliverables. This role does not originate design concepts but ensures that work produced by external design consultants is accurate, technically sound, fully coordinated, and aligned with brand requirements, directly influencing the long-term integrity of the Nando’s brand through effective design leadership, problemsolving, and decisionmaking. 

 

Key Responsibilities 

 

Design Strategy, Standards & Roadmap 

• Contributes to shaping the multiyear physical environment strategy, ensuring design standards evolve to meet guest expectations, operational efficiency, cost performance, and brand direction.  

• Lead the creation, governance, and continuous improvement of brand design standards, including layouts, spatial logic, FF&E, finishes, detailing, and material specifications. 

• Monitor emerging design and construction trends and work jointly with Construction to evaluate impacts, mitigate risks, and develop recommendations that ensure Nando’s environments remain operationally efficient, costeffective, and futureready. 

• Partner with Brand, Operations, and Development to ensure standards reflect consumer preferences, operational realities, and emerging restaurant formats. 

 

Program Leadership & Cross-Functional Alignment 

• Lead the design program across NROs, remodels, r