Director, Portfolio & Insights

Job Title: Director, Portfolio & Insights 
Location: Germany
Reports To: Vice President, Marketing, GERMANY 
 

Role Purpose 

At The Coca-Cola Company, insights power growth.  The Director, Portfolio & Insights leads the local Human Insights and market intelligence agenda within the Europe Operating Unit. The role will lead the generation and activation of consumer, shopper, and category insights. The Director also manages the Senior Manager, Portfolio & Insights GERMANY, ensuring clarity of priorities, capability development, and strong engagement. 

This role is accountable for translating deep human understanding, advanced analytics, and category foresight into strategies that drive market share, profitability, and long-term brand relevance at the country level. 

This leader is a strategic thought partner to Marketing, Commercial, Strategy, and Bottling System leadership ensuring insights are embedded end-to-end across strategy, innovation, creative development, and portfolio choices, while maintaining strong connectivity with the EOU and Global Insights networks. 

What You’ll Do for Us 

Lead the Consumer and Shopper Strategy & Leadership 

• Develop and implement the local Consumer and Shopper Insights learning plan in alignment with EOU Portfolio and Insights and Category networks. 

• Serve as the consumer voice across stakeholder groups, grounding business decisions in consumer and shopper led insights. 

• Deliver market specific actionable insights connected to locally relevant needs, motivations and perceptions that shape brand strategy, positioning, and in market execution. 

• Produce localized shopper insights (barriers, triggers, journeys) taking into account the country channel mix and embed insights into POS, in-store superiority, and channel activation 

Translate Human Understanding Into Business Guidance  

• Act as the single point of accountability for consumer, shopper, and category insights, ensuring consistency in frameworks while keeping them locally relevant. 

• Turn human motivations, barriers, and behaviors into actionable recommendations for marketing, commercial, and innovation teams. 

• Influence decisions on portfolio strategy, execution priorities, media focus, and recruitment strategies through insight‑driven narratives. 

Bring Analytical Excellence and Next‑Gen Insight Capabilities 

• Define and lead marketing performance analytics to focusing on enabling brand growth. 

• Integrate multiple data sources—syndicated, shopper, bottler, first‑party digital, and proprietary research—to deliver coherent, holistic insights. 

• Apply next‑gen insight capabilities—developed in partnership with the EU OU Human Insights team—leveraging AI/ML models, predictive analytics, behavioral science, and digital intelligence to translate signals into actionable business opportunities. 

• Leverage digital ethnography, social listening, sentiment AI, and cultural intelligence to detect emerging behaviors and whitespace opportunities. 

Brand & Innovation Insights Activation 

Provide insights leadership across key marketing processes:  

• Lead innovation opportunity identification, concept development, product and packaging assessment, consumer cocreation and New Product Launch Tracking 

• Develop insights for creative territories; support creative briefing, development, validation, and optimization. 

• Ensure insights activation that influences senior marketing and commercial decisionmakers. 

Lead, Inspire, and Build Capability 

• Drive a culture of curiosity and learning across the system, acting as the clear, influential voice of the consumer and shopper to senior leadership and bottler partners. 

Network & People Leadership 

• Bring country‑level trends, signals, and insights to the OU to inform broader strategic decisions. 

• Contribute to the EU OU Human Insights network by sharing learnings, deploying best practices and sometimes leading charter learning plans. 

• Manage, coach, and develop the Senior Manager, Portfolio & Insights Germany ensuring clarity of priorities, capability development and engagement. 

Qualifications & Experience 

• Bachelor’s degree required. 

• 10+ years of experience in Consumer & Shopper  Insights, Market Research & Analytics, Category Management or related field; Marketing or Innovation experience preferred. 

• German speaking

• Proven ability to influence senior leaders and drive decisions across complex, matrixed, and multi market organizations. 

• Proven knowledge of key research tools and agile insight methodologies. 

• Ability to design trend frameworks and facilitate workshops that convert insights into business solutions. 

• Expertise in Brand Health Tracking, shopper/HHP data, and proprietary research platforms plus future back human insights, scenario planning, and understanding cultural and behavioral trends. 

• Strong ability to translate complex research into clear business implications and strategic recommendations. 

• Strong people leadership capabilities with a track record of building and inspiring diverse teams. 

• Excellent communication and storytelling skills, including experience engaging C-suite stakeholders. 

• Ability to operate calmly and decisively in high pressure or ambiguous environments (e.g., contract negotiations, business reviews). 

• Fact based, structured communication and strong influencing capabilities. 

What We Can Do For You 

• Iconic & Innovative Brands: Work with a portfolio of 250+ global and local brands, continuously expanding through innovation. 

• Expansive & Diverse Customers: Engage with a wide range of customers across multiple channels and moments. 

• Critical Experiences: Operate within a global, cross functional network that drives transformational results. 

• Growth Culture: Thrive in a learning driven, action oriented environment that empowers curiosity and human insight.