De Laat (pictured) is currently director of customer value management at Lloyds Banking Group, and has previously held similar roles with Thomas Cook, O2 and Vodafone.

At John Lewis he will be responsible for increasing the Partnership’s customer insight capabilities and and will help develop greater understanding of shopping behaviour in John Lewis and Waitrose. He will report directly to Charlie Mayfield, chairman at the John Lewis Partnership.

Mayfield said: “Customer insight is an increasingly sophisticated area and a central part of part of modern retailing. Paul’s appointment to this newly created role demonstrates our commitment to understand every aspect of our customers’ shopping behaviour, across both John Lewis and Waitrose, so that we can enhance the service we offer to customers.”