Lead, Retention Strategy

Coursera and Udemy have combined to create one of the world’s most comprehensive skills development platforms for the AI era. Coursera was launched in 2012 with a mission to provide universal access to world-class learning, partnering with leading universities and industry experts to offer courses, Specializations, Professional Certificates, and degrees. The platform’s AI-powered innovations—such as personalized learning guides, Role Play, and Course Builder—enable scalable, verified, and role-based learning experiences. Institutions and learners globally rely on Coursera to upskill in high-demand fields like GenAI, data science, technology, and business.

About the role

Within the Consumer organization, the Monetization team shapes how customers evaluate, purchase, renew, and benefit from the combined Udemy and Coursera portfolio. We are seeking a Lead, Retention Strategy to drive the strategy, operating cadence, and cross-functional agenda for reducing voluntary and involuntary churn across our Consumer business. In this role, you will analyze why customers churn, identify high-impact retention opportunities, and build business cases to prioritize initiatives across Product, Lifecycle, Monetization, Payments, Analytics, Data Science, Research, and Support. You will serve as a key thought partner to leaders across the Consumer organization, ensuring retention opportunities are clearly diagnosed, financially sized, prioritized, tested, and scaled.

Responsibilities

• Track Coursera + Udemy retention metrics across key customer segments, geographies, platforms, acquisition channels, buyer segments, subscription products, and renewal cohorts to identify drivers of voluntary and involuntary churn.
• Develop a data-driven retention strategy by partnering with Research, Analytics, Data Science, and Support to combine customer behavior, qualitative insights, and business performance data into prioritized opportunities and business cases.
• Analyze key customer journeys—including onboarding, discovery, engagement, subscription usage, cancellation, renewal, save, and winback—to improve learner value, renewal rates, engagement, and long-term customer value.
• Partner with Product, Lifecycle, Monetization, and Payments teams to prioritize and shape retention initiatives, such as engagement strategies, pricing and promotions, save/winback programs, and payment recovery efforts.
• Own the retention experimentation roadmap, including opportunity sizing, prioritization, test design, readouts, and recommendations for scaling successful initiatives.
• Lead the cross-functional retention operating cadence, aligning stakeholders on priorities, progress, risks, decisions, and execution while driving accountability across teams.
• Develop scalable frameworks, metrics, and decision tools to enable consistent evaluation, prioritization, and measurement of retention initiatives.
• Communicate retention performance, strategic recommendations, and business impact through executive-ready narratives, dashboards, business cases, and decision documents.

Requirements

• 7+ years of experience in retention strategy, growth, monetization, product strategy, lifecycle marketing, analytics, management consulting, business operations, or a related analytical discipline.
• Experience driving strategy and decision-making in a subscription or recurring revenue business, with exposure to retention, renewal, churn, engagement, pricing, payments, or monetization.
• Strong analytical skills with experience using customer and business data to diagnose problems, size opportunities, evaluate experiments, and develop business cases.
• Proven ability to influence cross-functional teams and drive alignment across complex initiatives.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including experience presenting recommendations to senior leaders.
• Strong ownership, business judgment, and ability to operate independently in an ambiguous environment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in a consumer subscription, SaaS, marketplace, e-commerce, media, or education technology business.
• Experience leading initiatives focused on retention, renewal, churn reduction, lifecycle engagement, payment recovery, or customer lifetime value.
• Familiarity with experimentation, SQL or BI tools, and working closely with Analytics or Data Science teams.
• Experience developing executive-level business reviews, strategic recommendations, or operating dashboards.

Pay

This role is available in the following US Pay Zones:

• US Zone 3: $147,475 - $173,500
• US Zone 4: $137,275 - $161,500

At Coursera, we offer competitive, zone-based pay aligned to your location, experience, and role level across four U.S. pay zones. Our total rewards package includes comprehensive health and wellness benefits, bonus and RSU equity programs, and global perks designed to support your growth and well-being.

US Pay Zones:

• Zone 1: San Francisco Bay Area only
• Zone 2: New York City Metro and Seattle Metro
• Zone 3: CA (outside of SF Bay Area), CO, CT, DC, GA, IL, MA, MD, NY/NJ (outside of NYC Metro), OR, RI, TX, VA, WA (outside of Seattle Metro)
• Zone 4: All other US locations not listed in Zones 1–3