Chief of Staff Customer Officer

At The Hershey Company, our culture is rooted in purpose and inspired by Milton Hershey’s enduring vision that business should create opportunity for others. Through our commitment to corporate philanthropy, we create positive impact by supporting communities, helping children thrive, and operating as a business for good. This includes our deep and long-standing partnership with Milton Hershey School, where we invest in education, workforce readiness, and hands-on engagement to help students succeed beyond the classroom.

Location of Job: Hershey, PA
Will consider remote candidates who reside near a major airport.

About the role

The Hershey Company is seeking our next Chief of Staff to the Chief Customer Officer (CCO). This role serves as a strategic right-hand to the CCO, acting as a force-multiplier in driving Hershey’s global brand agenda. The Chief of Staff orchestrates the execution of the strategic plan and top-priority initiatives, ensuring they progress efficiently across the U.S. business. By coordinating cross-functional teams and business processes, this leader enables the CCO to focus on high-impact decisions while maintaining momentum on key projects. In essence, the role bridges strategy and execution—improving decision quality and speed and optimizing how global brand strategies are implemented enterprise-wide.

Responsibilities

• Strategic Planning Liaison: Lead the Customer Officer annual planning process and strategy on behalf of the CCO. Align business unit plans with enterprise objectives and prepare strategy reviews. Ensure that long-range strategic priorities are clearly defined, communicated, and translated into actionable roadmaps for the U.S. organization.
• Program Leadership & Execution: Oversee and drive execution of the CCO’s highest-priority initiatives and strategic projects. Set up project structures, track milestones, and proactively resolve roadblocks. Lead cross-functional project teams when needed to guarantee strategic initiatives deliver expected outcomes on time.
• Operational Excellence: Ensure effective processes for strategic initiatives by coordinating across different functional areas to streamline operating rhythms.
• Decision Support & Governance: Act as a proxy for the CCO in leadership forums and decision meetings, uniting stakeholders and enforcing governance around growth decisions. Prepare agendas and briefing materials for executive meetings, ensure data-driven discussions, and follow up on action items. Facilitate fact-based decision-making by ensuring the right information and analyses are available to the CCO and leadership team.
• Communication & Alignment: Serve as a communication hub to align the Customer Office with other parts of the business. Cascade the CCO’s vision and updates to teams and surface insights and concerns from across the organization back to the CCO. Maintain open channels with business unit leaders and supporting functions to ensure strategic priorities are understood and feedback is integrated, fostering a one-team culture in executing growth plans.

Requirements

• Strategic agility
• Program management excellence
• Influence and collaboration
• Business acumen
• Adaptability and problem-solving

Qualifications

A bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Commercial Management, or a related field is required; an MBA or similar advanced degree is strongly preferred. The ideal candidate has 10+ years of experience in strategic planning, business operations, or marketing leadership roles, including leading cross-functional initiatives and partnering closely with senior executives on strategic decision-making. Experience within a top-tier consulting firm or corporate strategy function is highly desirable, as is a track record of developing and launching growth initiatives within a consumer-focused organization. Candidates should also possess people management experience or significant project team leadership experience, along with a demonstrated ability to drive organizational change, improve processes, and deliver measurable business results.