Product & Package Assurance Program Manager Principal Scientist, R&D – Consumer Experience (CX)

Kraft Heinz; Glenview (IL); Hybrid; USD 104,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare coverage

401k

Flexible work arrangements

Job summary

Kraft Heinz is seeking a Program Manager for Product & Package Assurance to scale the enterprise benchmarking program. You will translate consumer experiences into technical specs and partner with R&D, Marketing, and Market Insights to ensure excellence and continuous improvement.

The role focuses on turning benchmarking into a repeatable business capability that fuels innovation while maintaining rigorous evaluation and vendor oversight.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field.
• 6+ years in consumer/product research or related insights.
• Ability to translate consumer needs into clear experience requirements and decision criteria.

Responsibilities

• Stand up and evolve the benchmarking program with training and rollout.
• Standardize guidelines, standards, and adherence mechanisms.
• Lead RCA on experience outages and drive sustained improvements.
• Translate consumer experience signals into technical action and product updates.
• Develop training and playbooks to ensure cross-functional consistency.

Skills

Cross-functional leadership

Project management

Executive communication

Root cause analysis

Vendor management

CX research methods

Education

Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field

Tools

AI tooling

Job description

Job Description

Job Purpose

The Product & Package Assurance Program Manager is accountable for building, scaling, and delivering executional excellence of the Kraft Heinz enterprise benchmarking program to maintain & strengthen in-market product and packaging performance. You develop and standardize program guidelines and ways of working to drive sustained performance & improvements through sound research, including root cause analysis (RCA) on experience outages. Through this work, you translate consumer experiences into clear technical specifications and product/package design updates. You partner closely with R&D partners (Product, Process, Packaging, Analytical Sciences, Quality), Marketing, and Market Insights to ensure the program is executed with excellence and improves over time. This role is responsible for turning benchmarking into a repeatable business capability that accelerates innovation and renovation while maintaining fit-for-purpose rigor based on decision risk.

Overview of the CX Product & Package Assurance Team

The CX Product Insights Product & Package Assurance Team maintains & strengthens in-market product and packaging performance by translating consumer experience signals into clear direction that R&D and cross-functional partners can use to improve products. Their benchmarking program provides consistent, comparable measurement of product and packaging experiences to identify performance gaps, diagnose drivers, and track improvement over time.

Essential Functions & Responsibilities

Program launch, evolution, and consistency

• Stand up and evolve the benchmarking program, including methodology training and rollout.
• Own continuous improvement of guidelines, standards, and adherence mechanisms.

Methodology & standardization

• Standardize program elements including screeners, questionnaires, product presentation standards, reporting, sensemaking/RCA process, cuttings & product release, analytical measurements, whether to include qualitative inputs in reporting, and leverage AI.
• Create and maintain playbooks/toolkits and training to ensure consistency across teams and time.

Execution excellence & reliability

• Manage a CX Benchmarking Scientist who leads execution & planning.
• Ensure high-quality, repeatable execution across benchmarking workstreams through clear process, documentation, and corrective actions when issues occur.
• Through close partnership with CX Associate Directors & Procurement, lead process to ensure strong vendor partners for benchmarking, plus monitor performance and partnership for continuous improvement.
• Lead RCA on experience outages; drive sustained improvements and prevent recurrence.

Translation to technical action

• Translate consumer experience signals into attributes needed to win, then develop product/package design updates and technical specifications to ensure a lasting advantage.
• Develop & lead key attribute training for cross-functional teams and in-plant as appropriate

Expected Experience & Required Skills

• Bachelor’s degree minimum (Consumer Behavior/Psychology, Marketing Research, Engineering, Food Science, Human Factors, Industrial Design, or related STEM field).
• Minimum of 6+ years (BS), 5+ years (MS) or 4+ years (PhD) in consumer/product research, consumer experience, or applied insights supporting product development and commercialization—CPG or food & beverage strongly preferred—with demonstrated progression as a technical authority across multiple brands/platforms and vendor ecosystems.
• Proven ability to influence product and packaging innovation/renovation decisions by translating consumer needs into clear experience requirements and decision criteria.
• Strong technical oversight: expert scoping, critical review of study quality, and ability to QA vendor work (methods, analysis, and interpretation).
• Recognized expertise across CX research methods (qualitative and quantitative), including end-to-end study design, instrument development, analysis planning, synthesis, and storytelling; ability to select methods based on decision risk and learning objectives.
• Proven experience leading complex, cross-functional programs with multiple stakeholders, and delivery milestones
• Strong project/program management skills: critical path planning, risk/issue management, dependency mapping, and rigorous follow-through.
• Bias toward standardization and process improvement; able to simplify ambiguity into clear plans and ownership.
• Strong executive-ready communication skills: concise updates, clear decisions/asks, and structured escalation when needed.
• Ability to influence without authority across technical and commercial teams; comfortable aligning competing priorities under time pressure.
• Demonstrated capability building: coaching, technical training, and establishing best practices/standards in a matrixed organization.
• Ability to travel up to 10% of the time.

Work Environment & Schedule

We believe the office is a critical driver of innovation, connection, and development, but also realize providing flexibility to our employees is critical. To create a more agile and modern workplace, this position will be able to work virtually for up to two days each week and will be expected to work in-person at the assigned work location at least three days per workweek.

This job description is not designed to cover or contain all duties or responsibilities that are required of the role. Duties or responsibilities may change or be added with or without notice.

Our Total Rewards philosophy is to provide a meaningful and flexible spectrum of programs that equitably support our diverse workforce and their families and complement Kraft Heinz’ strategy and values.

New Hire Base Salary Range

$104,200.00 - $130,200.00

Bonus: This position is eligible for a performance-based bonus as provided by the plan terms and governing documents.

The compensation offered will take into account internal equity and may vary depending on the candidate's geographic region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience among other factors.

Benefits: Coverage for employees (and their eligible dependents) through affordable access to healthcare, protection, and saving for the future, we offer plans tailored to meet you and your family’s needs. Coverage for benefits will be in accordance with the terms and conditions of the applicable plans and associated governing plan documents.

Wellbeing

We offer events, resources, and learning opportunities that inspire a physical, social, emotional, and financial well-being lifestyle for our employees and their families.

Benefits

• Physical - Medical, Prescription Drug, Dental, Vision, Screenings/Assessments
• Social - Paid Time Off, Company Holidays, Leave of Absence, Flexible Work Arrangements, Recognition, Training
• Emotional – Employee Assistance Program , Wellbeing Programs, Family Support Programs
• Financial – 401k, Life, Accidental Death & Dismemberment, Disability

Location(s)

Glenview R&D Center

Kraft Heinz is an Equal Opportunity Employer – Underrepresented Ethnic Minority Groups/Women/Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities/Sexual Orientation/Gender Identity and other protected classes. In order to ensure reasonable accommodation for protected individuals, applicants that require accommodation in the job application process may contact [e-mail] for assistance.