Job Description
Love. It’s what makes Subaru, Subaru®. And as a leading auto brand in the US, we strive to be More Than a Car Company®. Subaru believes in being a positive force in the communities in which we live and work, not just with donations but with actions that set an example for others to follow. That’s what we call our Subaru Love Promise®.
Summary:
The Carline Planning Specialist operates as a key communication conduit between Product Management and various departments across the Subaru of America (SOA) organization. This role is responsible for effectively communicating relevant and accurate product information at the right time. The Carline Planning specialist works with a Carline Planning Manager and collaborates across the Product Management team to generate research and forecast proposals for current and future products, for model lineups, and vehicle equipment concerning technology, pricing, profitability and more. The Carline Planning Specialist also generates vehicle equipment, features and specification data for current and upcoming vehicles, will share that data with appropriate stakeholders to ensure alignment, consistency, and timeliness on key initiatives.
Primary Responsibilities:
Research and Forecasting 60%
- With guidance from Carline Planning Managers, formulates new product ideas and proposals based on market research, target customer data, quantitative and qualitative surveys, and product portfolio roadmaps.
- Employs consumer-based user-experience research techniques and human-centered design methodology to efficiently and effectively solve for business needs and meet product objectives using industry data from multiple internal and external resources.
- Delivers compelling insights, stories, and visualizations to help drive evidence-based product and design decisions which address identified end-user complaints about the vehicle.
- Evaluates pricing proposals for assigned vehicle carlines via competitive analysis, equipment content valuation, and predictive modeling. Provides recommendations on pricing to Carline Planning Managers and works with Product Planning and Pricing team in order to present practical pricing proposals.
- Forecasts product trends from the automotive industry and trends in consumer electronics, technology, fashion industry, and color industry.
- Helps develop target user profiles, and creative storytelling tools to design vehicles to best suit user needs.
- Collaborates with various departments to communicate relevant product information at the proper time and gather information needed for the product proposals to Subaru of America (SOA) Executive team and Subaru Corporation (SBR).
Specification Implementation 30%
- Utilizes current model year equipment specifications to create specification assets which are then made available to internal SOA departments.
- Supports multiple SOA departments to ensure all product materials and assets are accurate, with the support of Carline Planning Manager and SBR Liaisons. Serves as liaison between Product Management and the inquiring department to answer product-related questions. Proofreads documents developed by Carline Planning Manager.
Data Integration 10%
- Authors and maintains database, which serves as an internal information hub for storing and accessing product information.
- Ensures that all vehicle specs for multiple vehicle models is current and accurate. Responds quickly to time-sensitive tasks to get information from official specification documents into database.
- Leads identification and coordination of Database Roadmap enhancements. Recognizes database changes that may be needed, process improvements that could be made to reduce manual work, and serves as day-to-day contact between Product Management and Information Technology to plan database enhancements.
- Collaborates with SOA stakeholders to maintain database.
Additional Responsibilities:
- Coordinates approximately seven (7) test vehicles including scheduling the periodic service, ensuring that vehicles are ready for product evaluation.
Required Skills & Abilities:
- Strong ability to work with research, data, and analytics to identify meaningful insights.
- Comfortable with independently planning, prioritizing, conducting, analyzing, and communicating data into trends/insights to provide visualization and story-telling in a variety of contexts, including C-Suite interactions.
- Strong ability to develop convincing recommendations. Exhibited success presenting complex research data (qualitative and quantitative) in a clear and compelling manner, including recommendations, that inspire action.
- Experience working with ambiguity in a high-pressure environment.
- Good understanding of the visualization techniques and ability to solve business problems through visualization. Proficient using at least one visualization product (Power BI, Tableau, Qlik, etc.).
- Ability to effectively manage a large workload and multiple priorities.
- Ability to establish and maintain effective relationships across departments, business areas, vendors, other outside teams.
- Strong advocate for user-centered design/evidence-based approach to product development while balancing business needs.
- Competency in data mining in systems such as mTab, JATO, Statista, Experian, etc.
Preferred Skills
- Experience with Design Forecasting and Color Material Finish Trending, as well as proficiency in Adobe Cloud Suite. Familiarity with trend forecasting resources such as WGSN.
- Understanding of project management software such as WorkFront, Jira, Fleetio, etc
Skills Keywords
- Exploratory Data Analysis
- Survey/Aggregation and Analysis
- Predictive Modeling and Trending
- Qualitative Research
- Quantitative Research
- Data Visualization
- Statistics
- Microsoft Suite- PowerPoint, Excel, Word
- Customer Journey Mapping
- Strategic Planning
- Project Management
- User Personas
- Heuristic Evaluation
Education/Experience Requirements: BA/BS with 6 to 8 years of relevant experience
Work Environment
- Hybrid Role: Remote work 2 days per week (After 90 Days Onboarding)
- Required Travel:
Compensation: The recruiting base salary range for this full-time position is $78900- $94000 / year. Within the range, individual pay is determined by factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. (P3) In addition to competitive salary, Subaru offers an amazing benefits package that includes:
- Medical, Dental, Vision Plans
- Pension, Profit Sharing, and 401K Match Offerings
- 15 Vacation days, 9 Company Holidays, 5 Floating Holidays, and 5 Sick days
- Tuition Reimbursement Program
- Vehicle Discount Programs
- See our Careers landing page for additional information about our compensation and benefit programs.