Asda has announced the appointment of James Goodman as chief people officer.

He will join the firm later this year from Tesco, where he spent twelve years. He held the role of people director for the UK and ROI and was responsible for all people related matters including labour relations, recruitment, learning, early careers and health and wellbeing.

Goodman also spent seven years working at Gap, where he worked in several human resources roles.

“I’m looking forward to welcoming James to Asda later this year,” said Allan Leighton, Asda executive chairman. “He brings a huge amount of experience with him and will be a vital part of the leadership team as we continue to rebuild and deliver on our ambition to once again be the best place to work in the UK.”

In March, Asda dismissed around 200 employees involved in its £800 million IT upgrade project, marking the second round of redundancies in five months under new chairman Allan Leighton.

The staff were contracted to work on "Project Future" - a major initiative to separate the supermarket's IT systems from former owner Walmart.

Walmart granted Asda an extension to the completion deadline, allowing the supermarket to avoid a multimillion-pound penalty charge after missing the original target.

---