Program Lead

About the role

The Program Lead Manager II – Consulting at UST is responsible for providing senior functional leadership to UST and client teams across retail solution requirements, business processes, roadmaps, and solution definition. This role requires significant experience with global or highly distributed retailers and large, interdependent workstreams, with a deep understanding of item and product lifecycle, category and assortment planning, pricing and promotions, inventory, replenishment, supplier management, allocation, and forecasting.

Responsibilities

• Maintain an enterprise-wide view across workstreams, expose dependencies, and identify common capabilities and standardization opportunities.
• Align business, product, technology, architecture, delivery, vendor, and operational stakeholders whose priorities may not naturally agree.
• Drive merchandising-centered retail strategy and a unified, role-based user experience.
• Convert strategic intent into decisions executable at scale and grounded in firsthand delivery experience.
• Lead retail business strategy and functional solution direction for enterprise modernization initiatives.
• Define future-state retail capabilities, business processes, and operating model implications.
• Advise leaders on modernization sequencing, solution priorities, trade-offs, and transformation roadmaps.
• Balance global consistency with practical market, functional, and operating needs.
• Provide expertise to client teams as they define, validate, and prioritize requirements.
• Identify shared capabilities, conflicting assumptions, dependencies, and reuse opportunities across workstreams.

Requirements

• Minimum 20 years building, deploying, or transforming large-scale retail solutions.
• Significant merchandising solution experience with broad understanding of adjacent functions and integrations.
• Deep expertise in item and product lifecycle, category and assortment planning, pricing and promotions, inventory, replenishment, supplier management, allocation, and forecasting.
• Experience advising executives, functional leaders, product teams, architects, delivery organizations, and third-party providers.
• In-depth knowledge of retail solutions, business processes, operating models, and implementation patterns.
• Enterprise thinking across workstreams, capabilities, data, integrations, UX, and operations.
• Exceptional stakeholder management, influence, negotiation, facilitation, and conflict-resolution skills.
• Strong presentation and consultative selling skills with judgment to tailor messages to executives and practitioners.
• Strategic problem-solving and ability to move from ambiguity to actionable direction.
• Servant leadership, adaptability, resilience, and comfort across cultures, geographies, levels, and delivery models.
• Credibility built through practical execution, not solely frameworks or theoretical best practices.
• Ability to recognize downstream effects across supply chain, warehouses, finance, digital channels, data, integrations, and club execution.

Qualifications

• Product leader for a commercial retail solution provider.
• Senior retail SME, functional architect, practice leader, or head of major retail implementations.
• Retail consulting or systems integration leader accountable for enterprise-scale outcomes.

Skills

• Application Migration
• Retail Solutions
• Stakeholder Management
• Merchandising
• Negotiation
• Product Management
• Supply Chain Management
• Warehouse Operations
• UX Design
• Sales
• Inventory Management

Benefits

• Paid vacation
• Paid sick leave
• 10 paid holidays
• Paid bereavement leave
• Paid jury duty
• 401(k) Retirement Plan with employer matching
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance
• Accidental death and disability insurance
• Short- and long-term disability benefits
• Health Savings Account (HSA)
• Flexible Spending Account (FSA)

Pay

Compensation can differ depending on factors including but not limited to the specific office location, role, skill set, education, and level of experience. UST provides a reasonable range of compensation for roles that may be hired in various U.S. markets as set forth below.

Schedule

Full-time, regular employees accrue a minimum of 10 days of paid vacation per year, receive 6 days of paid sick leave each year (pro-rated for new hires throughout the year), 10 paid holidays, and are eligible for paid bereavement leave and jury duty. They are eligible to participate in the Company’s 401(k) Retirement Plan with employer matching. They and their dependents residing in the US are eligible for medical, dental, and vision insurance, as well as the following Company-paid Employee Only benefits: basic life insurance, accidental death and disability insurance, and short- and long-term disability benefits. Regular employees may purchase additional voluntary short-term disability benefits, and participate in a Health Savings Account (HSA) as well as a Flexible Spending Account (FSA) for healthcare, dependent child care, and/or commuting expenses as allowable under IRS guidelines. Benefits offerings vary in Puerto Rico. Part-time employees receive 6 days of paid sick leave each year (pro-rated for new hires throughout the year) and are eligible to participate in the Company’s 401(k) Retirement Plan with employer matching. Full-time temporary employees receive 6 days of paid sick leave each year (pro-rated for new hires throughout the year) and are eligible to participate in the Company’s 401(k) program with employer matching. They and their dependents residing in the US are eligible for medical, dental, and vision insurance. Part-time temporary employees receive 6 days of paid sick leave each year (pro-rated for new hires throughout the year).