Senior Manager, Customer Insights ( Onsite-Portland Oregon)

Senior Manager, Customer Insights

SymphonyAI is now hiring a Senior Manager, Customer Insights to be onsite with our client located in Portland, Oregon. This is a role for someone who doesn't just deliver insights they embed themselves in the client's world, become indispensable to the team, and make the analytics platform part of how the client thinks every day.

As a Senior Manager, Customer Insights, you will be the dedicated consulting presence inside one of our grocery retail clients working alongside category managers, merchant teams & leaders to translate customer data into decisions. You will own your client relationships, manage your own priorities, and deliver high-quality, actionable work without waiting to be told what to do.

What sets the best people in this role apart isn't just analytical skill it's curiosity. The ability to hear a business question and ask three more questions before touching the data. To probe, spiral, and get to the real problem underneath. And then to bring the answer back in a way the client can actually use.

You will also be a champion for SymphonyAI tools including the AI-powered capabilities that are increasingly central to what we deliver. That means actively using AI tools in your own work, helping clients understand what AI-driven insights mean for their business, and being the person who makes new technology feel accessible rather than intimidating.

Job Description

What You'll Do

Embedded Client Consulting

• Serve as the day-to-day customer insights partner for your assigned clients present, engaged, and proactively adding value.
• Build trusted relationships with category managers, merchants, and senior leaders through consistent delivery and deep business understanding.
• Represent SymphonyAI on-site or virtually as a seamless extension of the client's team; not a vendor relationship.
• Manage your own project queue, prioritize competing demands, and deliver without relying on escalation or hand-holding.

Probe, Spiral & Deliver Actionable Insights

• When a client asks a question, ask three more understand the business problem behind the business question before building anything.
• Lead end-to-end analytical projects from data pull through synthesis, story, and recommendation.
• Convert complex outputs from customer, loyalty, and merchandising data into clear, decision-ready insights.
• Ensure every deliverable answers'so what?' and 'now what?' not just 'what happened.'
• Maintain a high bar for quality and rigor; validate your own work before it reaches the client.

AI & Tool Advocacy

• Actively use AI tools in your own day-to-day work for analysis, synthesis, drafting, and problem-solving and bring that hands-on familiarity into client conversations.
• Help clients understand, interpret, and trust AI-driven insights from SymphonyAI platforms, translating outputs into plain language and clear business implications.
• Bridge the gap between 'the AI said this' and 'here's what you should do about it' making AI-powered recommendations actionable and credible.
• Train client teams on SymphonyAI tools, actively demonstrating how AI-driven features connect to their specific business outcomes.
• Bring a consultative-sales mindset to tool adoption: understand the client's goals well enough to show not tell why the tools matter.
• Relay client feedback on AI features and tools back to internal product and delivery teams.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Partner with CPG-focused groups on joint business planning and category-level insights.
• Contribute to best practices, training materials, and team knowledge-sharing.
• Participate in quality control and validation of reporting and data outputs.
• Support team and client meeting preparation, bringing your client knowledge to the table.

Who You Are

You're the kind of consultant who earns trust by knowing the client's business better than they expect who sees a last-minute pivot as a challenge to rise to, and who gets genuinely excited when a new AI tool changes how you approach a problem.

Deep Ownership: Treats the client's business like their own. Doesn't wait to be asked: spots problems, flags them, and acts. No task too big or too small.

Probe & Spiral: Asks the question behind the question. Doesn't accept the first answer or the surface request digs to understand the real business problem before building a single slide.

Independent Operator: Works without a playbook. Manages their own priorities, deadlines, and client relationships. Self-directed with high accountability and low need for hand-holding.

AI Curiosity: Actively uses AI tools in their own work and brings that enthusiasm into client conversations. Helps clients understand what AI-driven insights mean and why they should trust them without needing to be the technical expert.

Tool Champion: Genuinely enthused about SymphonyAI tools. Teaches, advocates, and finds creative ways to get clients using them. Has a consultative-sales instinct can articulate the 'why it matters' without being pushy.

Insight Translator: Bridges data and decisions. Can take a complex output from a BI or AI-driven tool and make it immediately actionable for a category manager or merchant.

Client Embedment: Becomes part of the client's team not a vendor on the side. Earns trust by showing up, knowing the business, and delivering consistently.

A Day In This Role

You might be...

What makes it great...

Sitting with a category manager who wants to know why sales dipped and with which customer segments and realizing three questions in that the real question is about a promotional strategy shift

You get to be the detective. Every conversation is a chance to reframe the problem better than the client could alone.

Walking a merchant team through an AI-driven SymphonyAI insight they've never seen before and helping them understand what it means for their next planogram decision

You're the bridge between the model and the merchant. That's a rare skill and a valuable one.

Using an AI tool to draft the first cut of a synthesis deck, then sharpening it into something client-ready

You work smarter. AI amplifies what you're already good at and you're not shy about using it.

Getting a last-minute request that changes your whole day and figuring it out

You're wired for this. The pace is fast, the clients are real, and the work matters.

Experience & Qualifications

Essential

Desirable ( = AI differentiators)

57 years in consulting, category management, or merchandising

Active use of AI tools (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, etc.) in day-to-day work

Direct client-facing experience in grocery retail or CPG

Experience helping clients adopt or trust AI-driven analytics outputs

Proven ability to work independently in a client-embedded environment

MBA or Master's degree

Experience coaching or training client teams on analytics tools

Hands-on SQL or data querying capability

Proficiency with BI tools (Power BI, Tableau, or similar)

Experience with SymphonyAI or similar retail analytics SaaS

Strong working knowledge of customer/loyalty data

Track record of expanding tool adoption within a client organization

Bachelor's degree in Business, Analytics, or related field

Experience at a management consulting firm

Demonstrated consultative problem-solving approach

Experience in pricing, promotion, or assortment analytics

Living Our Values

Innovation at Speed

Be courageous. Take risks, learn from mistakes, and bring new ideas.

Customer Focus

Build lasting client relationships. Act with integrity in every interaction.

Targeted Performance

Own your outcomes. Be accountable and persevere through complexity.

Unified as One

Break down silos. Share wins, support teammates, and enjoy the work.