BJ's Wholesale Club is a leading retail wholesale membership-only warehouse club chain headquartered in Massachusetts, employing 34,000 people across 250 clubs in 21 U.S. states. As a wholesale company with both field and headquarters teams, BJ's faced a significant challenge in broadening its leadership pipeline to be inclusive of leaders from throughout the company.

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The Challenge

Addressing Leadership Gaps in a Growing Retail Environment

BJ’s recognized the opportunity to expand its leadership pipeline to keep pace with evolving market demands and continued internal growth. Key focus areas included:

• Strengthening the pipeline of women into senior and enterprise leadership roles.
• Deepening connection, alignment, and shared ways of working across field and headquarters teams.
• Supporting retention by increasing clarity, access, and confidence in career progression.

BJ's sought a solution that would empower employees, foster cross-functional collaboration, and build a future-ready leadership pipeline.

The ACE Program

Partnering with Aurora, BJ's launched the Accelerating and Cultivating Excellence Program (ACE) in 2022, designed to develop leadership skills, adaptability, and confidence among women employees. Since ACE was launched, 126 employees have completed the program. The program features:

• Cohorts blending field and HQ employees to encourage cross-functional understanding
• Experiential learning, mentorship, and peer networking
• Focus on leadership behaviors, adaptability, and collaboration

Results

Empowered Leaders, Stronger Collaboration, and Measurable Impact

The ACE Program has delivered significant outcomes:

• 100% report more confidence in their ability to reach higher levels of leadership.
• 100% stated they can apply what they learned in the ACE Program at work.
• 100% report that they became more effective at influencing others.
• 100% said they better mapped their vision for their future at BJ’s.
• 100% feel more empowered to advocate for themselves.