Senior Manager, Customer Insights, Marketing

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Job Description

The customer is the focus of everything we do, and over a million end users rely on our products daily. We believe in the value of customer voice to ensure we solve the right critical problems for our business, which is why we need a self-motivated Customer Insights Senior Manager.

This role requires a highly motivated individual who has a passion for research that supports all aspects of Manulife Japan’s strategy. The incumbent will report to Head of Customer Experience to design, execute, manage and analyze findings from qualitative and quantitative research studies that could be run internally or with the help of external research suppliers.

The Customer Insights Senior Manager will use their creative and analytical mind to drive and influence business actions by synthesizing results across studies and/or combining them with internal customer data. They will work alongside colleagues with CX and HCD expertise, collaborating to bring the voice of the customer and agents to support the creation of human-centred and innovative products, services and experiences.

Responsibilities

• Support the establishment of the team as the Research Centre of Expertise within the business, and build a culture of seeking out insights to support decisions across the business.

Insights Delivery

• Consult with project stakeholders to understand problem statements. Based on agreed parameters, recommend the most relevant and optimal research or testing methodologies that will address the business questions to inform decisions within the timeframe, under Human Centred Design (HCD) approach
• Collaborate with our Advanced Analytics to generate data and insights across the business
• Design and implement research projects from inception to completion in-house: writing proposals, drafting discussion guides/questionnaires, arranging recruitment, moderating interviews/ focus groups/ usability tests, analysing the data, reporting, and presenting the findings to internal stakeholders
• Engage customers/agents/consumers directly through qualitative and usability research, with occasional quantitative support on needs basis
• Develop deep understanding of customers/agents/users by framing their preferences, feedback, and behavior in context of their mindset, needs, and journeys
• Sourcing and selection of research suppliers, working with the suppliers to use the best-in-class and cost effective solution for insight discovery and ensure high quality outputs are produced by vendor partners
• Manage strategic research and ad hoc research projects independently on a daily basis with high quality standard

Practice and Collaboration

• Explore new research methodologies/techniques or vendors to partner
• Provide support to local teams and ensure research findings are being interpreted accurately and correctly
• Collaborate with our Strategy team to support segmentation studies and development of customer personas to support journey mapping for Manulife Customers
• Promote customer-centric mindset within the organization

Support strategic business decisions

• Ensure that internal stakeholders understand the implications of research results and advise the business community to implement improvements.
• Conduct regular communication roadshows to ensure relevant groups and employees are well aware of current progress and future plans
• Lead the strategic application of competitive intelligence, market research, and internal analysis. Propose market research projects to management and work with internal clients.
• Collect and synthesize external research for product development and product positioning as well as conduct primary research and analysis on customer needs and behaviors, distribution channel performance and behavior, competitors and their product offerings and specific business situations that may be needed.

Drive actions based on insights:

• Work within the Customer Experience team to deliver actionable insights and recommendations for different BUs, project/ product owners, value stream transformation squads etc. through the integration of various customer data sources to provide comprehensive understanding of the consumers
• Work with different internal stakeholders to propose changes on current practice to improve customer experience
• Collaborate with the Regional CX & Transformation team to leverage thought leadership research for PR, agent content, customer comms and value proposition development
• Collaborate with the Regional CX & Transformation team to set up rNPS survey, provide insight analysis and understand sentiment, delivering bi-annual report with actionable insights; communicate with key stakeholders to align actions and follow up on action progress –collaborating with CX colleagues where change support required
• Make recommendations that will assist in driving strategic product and marketing efforts.

Accountabilities (Individual / Shared):

Individual Accountabilities:

• rNPS
• Research delivery and impact
  　　o Conduct of research studies /surveys (logistics of survey, questionnaire design, collaboration with internal users, etc.)
  　　o Research on competitive information
  　　o Reports and presentation of results
• Key Shared Accountabilities:
  • Roadmap of studies for the year
  • Management of Online Insight Community
  • Generation of actionable insights derived from the results of the study
  • Digital KPIs – e.g. Digital Platform active rates and service adoption
  • Employee Customer Centricity measures
  • tNPS

Qualifications

Knowledge/Skills/Competencies/Education:

Technical

• 5-10 years of experience in research management and/or analytics
• Strong knowledge of research method (quantitative and qualitative research) and statistical analysis e.g. regression, correlation, driver analysis
• Excellent data analysis, pattern identification, data visualization, charting and storytelling skills.
• Experience delivering segmentation, and designing research to support business decisions and actions - ranging from pricing, to be journeys and processes, and enhanced customer / user experiences
• Ability to translate data and customer/agent pain points into concrete recommendation and relevant actions for improvement
• Ability to understand and identify the impact of changes in operational process to the customer experience
• Highly motivated with experience managing projects under tight timelines
• Excellent project management skills
• Excellent negotiation skills
• Experienced in Excel, Word and PowerPoint
• Highly developed communication and relationship skills

Certification

• Bachelor’s degree or above in marketing, communications, applied mathematics, statistics, economics, business or social sciences

Communication

• Ask questions and productively challenge the status quo
• Effective, persuasive, ‘storytelling’ communication skills required, with ability to communicate across all hierarchy and levels of an organisation
• Excellent command of spoken and written Japanese, with English proficiency an advantage

Collaboration

• A positive disposition and ability to relate well with others, possessing high levels of empathy
• Results oriented, with a can-do attitude. Undeterred by obstacles and challenges; ability to think creatively to overcome barriers to achieve objectives
• Comfortable with ambiguity; open to new ideas; flexes with changing business priorities and situations

Nice to Haves:

• Experience in Financial Services/ Insurance Industry
• Client side experience
• Design Thinking (Human centered design) capabilities
• Designing/ facilitating internal/consumer workshops (co-creation, brainstorming, etc.)
• Journey mapping experience
• Familiarity with Net Promoter System a plus
• Experience in any of the following functional areas:
  • Customer Experience
  • Project Management
  • Call Centre/Customer Support Operations
  • Product Support Operations

About the Company

Manulife Financial Corporation is a leading international financial services provider, helping people make their decisions easier and lives better. To learn more about us, visit https://www.manulife.com/en/about/our-story.html.

Assessment

• The successful applicant will provide a resumé or CV
• Three rounds of interviews will take place with pre-screening, interview with hiring manager and interview with peers addressing both competency and behavioural questions

Problems/Challenges:

• Building practice of seeking research and confidence in utilizing insights to support decisions across the business

Position Dimensions (Organizational Impact):

• An individual contributor within Customer Experience tea
• Team of 7 within Customer Experience team, including expertise across NPS practice, Experience Design and Change Management.
• Customer Experience Team is one of 3 pillars under CMO’s Marketing organization.

Manulife is an Equal Opportunity Employer

At Manulife/John Hancock, we embrace our diversity. We strive to attract, develop and retain a workforce that is as diverse as the customers we serve and to foster an inclusive work environment that embraces the strength of cultures and individuals. We are committed to fair recruitment, retention, advancement and compensation, and we administer all of our practices and programs without discrimination on the basis of race, ancestry, place of origin, colour, ethnic origin, citizenship, religion or religious beliefs, creed, sex (including pregnancy and pregnancy-related conditions), sexual orientation, genetic characteristics, veteran status, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, family status, disability, or any other ground protected by applicable law.

It is our priority to remove barriers to provide equal access to employment. A Human Resources representative will work with applicants who request a reasonable accommodation during the application process. All information shared during the accommodation request process will be stored and used in a manner that is consistent with applicable laws and Manulife/John Hancock policies. To request a reasonable accommodation in the application process, contact recruitment@manulife.com.