Location(s):

United States of America

City/Cities:

Atlanta

Travel Required:

26% - 50%

Relocation Provided:

No

Job Posting End Date:

September 3, 2025

Shift:

Job Description Summary:

Location: Atlanta, GA (Global HQ) - onsite 3-4 days/week

Estimated Travel: 20-30% (Customer & Consumer Research, Customer Site visits)

The User Experience Lead is a senior strategic role tasked with driving exceptional customer and employee experiences while optimizing the usability of Coca-Cola equipment and interfaces. This person serves as a trusted advisor in designing seamless consumer journeys and efficient employee workflows, enabling customer satisfaction and operational efficiency.

Reporting directly to the Head of Experience Design, the User Experience Lead conducts user research and usability studies across industrial design of our equipment and user interface designs. The role applies user-centered design principles, translating consumer insights into actionable recommendations that shape innovative and scalable solutions.

Success is measured by metrics such as increased customer and employee customer satisfaction, net promoter scores, usability scores, improved operational workflows, and measurable product and service enhancements driven by user insights.

Key Responsibilities:

Customer and Employee Experience Specialist (50% of Role)

Consumer Journey Optimization: Collaborate with stakeholders to optimize consumer journeys across channels, including dine-in, drive-thru, delivery, and takeout experiences

Employee Workflow Excellence: Advise restaurants on operational efficiency and outlet design, focusing on equipment placement, ergonomic workflows, and optimized layouts to enhance employee productivity.

Cross-Channel Strategy: Align experience design across all channels, addressing unique challenges in physical layout and operational workflows.

Experience Research Implementation: Utilize user research to provide actionable recommendations for improving consumer and customer experiences. Apply human-centered design principles to balance aesthetics, functionality, cost, and efficiency in industrial and interface solutions.

User Testing and Design Evaluation (40% of Role)

Industrial Design and User Interface Testing: Conduct end-to-end research processes, including user recruitment, study design, moderation, data collection, analysis, and reporting. Evaluate the usability and impact of Coca-Cola equipment designs, such as dispensers and coolers, ensuring consumer and technician usability, brand alignment, and alignment with Jobs To Be Done. Test dispenser apps and screen designs with users to confirm ease of navigation, intuitive functionality, and overall satisfaction in selecting and customizing beverages.

Technician Evaluation: Study how service technicians interact with equipment design to ensure troubleshooting and maintenance workflows are streamlined.

Methodology Selection: Use a range of qualitative and quantitative research methods, including observation, usability testing, surveys, interviews, focus groups, formal and informal usability testing, competitive benchmarking, and ergonomic assessments. Apply high-fidelity and/or low-fidelity user testing, tailored to each situation and focusing on iterative improvement.

Design Recommendations: Collect objective behavioral and subjective measures, translating research findings into actionable recommendations for equipment and interface design improvement.

Design Thinking Facilitation: Lead workshops and structured sessions using design thinking principles to generate impactful solutions.

Project Management: Design and manage testing plans and milestones, organize testing recruitment and protocols, creation of testing collateral, report on status and results.

Innovation and Continuous Improvement (10% of Role)

Design Thinking Facilitation: Lead design thinking workshops, fostering idea generation and problem-solving alongside interdisciplinary teams.

Maintain expertise in the latest user experience tools, methodologies, and industry trends to apply innovative approaches to solutions.

Develop and prototype user-centered design concepts ranging from low-fidelity (paper-based) to high-fidelity (digital and interactive).

Key Deliverables:

Journey maps for consumer and employee workflows, reflecting all channels and tailored to various customer setups.

Usability testing reports, focusing on actionable design improvements.

Clear guidelines for ergonomic equipment placement and customer layout optimization.

User experience frameworks across equipment platforms, ensuring scalability and alignment with business objectives.

Enhanced customer and employee satisfaction scores, consumer usability, and operational efficiency, based on targeted design interventions.

Decision Rights:

Approval of research and testing methodologies.

Strategic recommendations for improving equipment design and interface usability, based on user-centered design insights.

Collaboration across stakeholders to align user testing data and actional design interventions.

Required Experience & Qualifications:

Degree in graphic design, industrial design, human factors engineering, cognitive psychology, ergonomics, human-computer interaction, user experience design, or similar.

10+ years’ experience with commercial and customer operations, especially in the food service industry.

5+ years’ experience in heuristic and ethnographic methodologies and usability analysis, both quantitative and qualitative.

Proven ability to translate research findings into actionable product and design recommendations.

Proven expertise in design thinking, user experience design, or product design, including facilitating workshops and structured creative sessions.

Strong knowledge of both industrial and user interface design principles.

Ability to engage customers and employees in actionable experience research.

Excellent communication skills to synthesize and present research findings to stakeholders through presentations and reports.

Ability to create prototypes, from low-fidelity (paper-based) to high-fidelity (digital and interactive)

Experience conducting user studies across physical products, digital apps, and service workflows.

Leadership Competencies:

Customer Advocate: Champions user-centric designs that deliver value for both consumers and commercial value.

Collaboration Navigator: Builds strong relationships across teams and stakeholders to co-create impactful designs solutions that align with business objectives.

Innovative Problem-Solver: Applies design thinking principles to create impactful solutions to operational and usability challenges.

Strategic Thinker: Balances short-term testing needs and long-term design goals for scalable solutions.

Empathy-Driven Advisor: Applies human-centered design thinking principles to effectively address user needs across diverse environments. 

Data-Driven Decision Maker: Uses research insights and behavioral data to influence product designs and usability strategies.

What We Can Do for You:

Iconic & Innovative Brands: Our portfolio represents over 250 products with some of the most popular brands in the world, including Coca-Cola, Simply, Fairlife & Topo Chico.

Expansive & Diverse Customers: We work with a diversified group of customers which range from retail & grocery outlets, theme parks, movie theatres, restaurants, and many more each day.

The Coca-Cola Company will not offer sponsorship for employment status (including, but not limited to, H1-B visa status and other employment-based nonimmigrant visas) for this position. Accordingly, all applicants must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis and must not require The Coca-Cola Company's sponsorship to continue to work legally in the United States.

Skills:

Customer Experience Research, Design Thinking, Ethnographic Methods, Heuristic Analysis, Human-Centered Design, Industrial Design, Usability Testing, User Experience (UX), User Experience (UX) Design

Pay Range:

$167,000 - $187,000

Base pay offered may vary depending on geography, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. A full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the position, is offered.

Annual Incentive Reference Value Percentage:

30

Annual Incentive reference value is a market-based competitive value for your role. It falls in the middle of the range for your role, indicating performance at target.

Our Purpose and Growth Culture:

We are taking deliberate action to nurture an inclusive culture that is grounded in our company purpose, to refresh the world and make a difference. We act with a growth mindset, take an expansive approach to what’s possible and believe in continuous learning to improve our business and ourselves. We focus on four key behaviors – curious, empowered, inclusive and agile – and value how we work as much as what we achieve. We believe that our culture is one of the reasons our company continues to thrive after 130+ years. Visit Our Purpose and Vision to learn more about these behaviors and how you can bring them to life in your next role at Coca-Cola.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and do not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, color, sex, age, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, status as a veteran, and basis of disability or any other federal, state or local protected class. When we collect your personal information as part of a job application or offer of employment, we do so in accordance with industry standards and best practices and in compliance with applicable privacy laws.