Customer Experience & Research VP - Payments

VP – Customer Experience & Research - Payments

The VP – Customer Experience & Research - Payments is a senior leader responsible for shaping the Payments customer experience strategy by translating deep customer, market, and industry insights into meaningful product, experience, and operating model improvements.

This role leads a team of customer experience and research professionals and serves as the enterprise authority on customer intelligence for PCS. The leader continuously synthesizes internal performance data, customer feedback, and external market signals to identify where experiences, products, and capabilities must evolve to meet changing customer expectations and competitive dynamics.

Operating at the intersection of customer, product, and strategy, this leader ensures customer insights are not only understood—but actively drive prioritization, investment decisions, and measurable experience improvements across the Payments portfolio.

Key Responsibilities

Customer Experience Research & Insight Strategy

• Establish and lead the end-to-end customer experience research and insights strategy for Payments.
• Define and maintain a forward-looking research agenda aligned to business priorities, product roadmaps, and emerging industry trends.
• Oversee qualitative and quantitative research, journey analysis, behavioral insights, and feedback mechanisms to develop a holistic view of customer needs, pain points, and adoption drivers.
• Ensure appropriate research rigor, including sampling strategies, statistical methods, and confidence thresholds, to support enterprise-level decision making.
• Guide teams in applying mixed-methods research to produce actionable, defensible insights.
• Establish clear distinctions between exploratory, evaluative, and decision-grade research to ensure the right level of rigor for each business question.
• Ensure insights are synthesized into clear, compelling narratives that inform executive decisions.

Customer Experience Measurement & Analytics

• Own the CX measurement architecture across Payments, including CSAT, NPS, CES, VoC, behavioral telemetry, and operational experience metrics.
• Define experience success measures tied to business outcomes such as growth, retention, usage, servicing efficiency, and risk reduction.
• Partner with Analytics and Data teams to integrate journey-level metrics, digital behavior data, and operational KPIs into a cohesive CX performance framework.
• Establish standards for signal quality, statistical rigor, and insight confidence across all CX and research outputs.
• Ensure experience measurement enables root-cause diagnosis and action, not just reporting.

Industry & Market Intelligence

• Continuously monitor payments, fintech, and customer experience trends to identify implications for PCS products, experiences, and capabilities.
• Benchmark PCS experience performance against industry peers and best-in-class experiences across financial services and adjacent industries.
• Translate external market signals into forward-looking recommendations for experience and product evolution.

Insight-to-Action Enablement

• Partner closely with Product, Design, Marketing, Operations, Analytics, and Technology leaders to embed customer insights into product strategy, experience design, and delivery execution.
• Identify where products, journeys, policies, or operating models must be changed, enhanced, or retired based on customer evidence.
• Champion a closed-loop approach where insights drive action, outcomes are measured, and learnings are continuously refined.
• Establish governance to track insight-driven decisions, actions taken, and realized outcomes.

Leadership & Team Development

• Lead, mentor, and develop a high-performing team of customer experience researchers and insight professionals.
• Establish best practices, standards, and governance for customer research and insight generation.
• Foster a culture of curiosity, rigor, and customer obsession.

Executive Influence & Storytelling

• Serve as a trusted advisor to senior PCS and enterprise leaders on customer experience priorities and implications.
• Translate complex insights into clear, compelling executive narratives that drive alignment and action.
• Advocate for the customer perspective in strategic planning, investment decisions, and transformation initiatives.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience; Masters degree preferred.
• 10+ years of progressive leadership experience in customer experience, research, insights, product strategy, or related disciplines.
• Demonstrated success translating customer insights into business, product, and experience outcomes at scale.

Preferred Skills/Experience

• Deep understanding of payments, financial services, or adjacent regulated industries.
• Proven ability to influence across complex, matrixed organizations without direct authority.
• Exceptional executive communication, storytelling, and stakeholder management skills.
• Experience leading customer experience research for consumer and/or small business financial products.
• Strong partnership experience with Product Management, Experience Design, and Analytics teams.
• Familiarity with agile product development and human-centered design methodologies.
• Experience integrating multiple data sources into cohesive insight frameworks.

Leadership Expectations

• Operates with an enterprise mindset and strategic perspective.
• Champions customer obsession and evidence-based decision making.
• Balances strategic vision with pragmatic execution.
• Models inclusive, transparent, and collaborative leadership behaviors.

The role offers a hybrid/flexible schedule, which means there's an in-office expectation of 3 or more days per week and the flexibility to work outside the office location for the other days.

If there's anything we can do to accommodate a disability during any portion of the application or hiring process, please refer to our disability accommodations for applicants.

Benefits:

Our approach to benefits and total rewards considers our team members' whole selves and what may be needed to thrive in and outside work. That's why our benefits are designed to help you and your family boost your health, protect your financial security and give you peace of mind. Our benefits include the following:

• Healthcare (medical, dental, vision)
• Basic term and optional term life insurance
• Short-term and long-term disability
• Pregnancy disability and parental leave
• 401(k) and employer-funded retirement plan
• Paid vacation (from two to five weeks depending on salary grade and tenure)
• Up to 11 paid holiday opportunities
• Adoption assistance
• Sick and Safe Leave accruals of one hour for every 30 worked, up to 80 hours per calendar year unless otherwise provided by law

U.S. Bank is an equal opportunity employer. We consider all qualified applicants without regard to race, religion, color, sex, national origin, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or veteran status, and other factors protected under applicable law.

U.S. Bank participates in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security E-Verify program in all facilities located in the United States and certain U.S. territories. The E-Verify program is an Internet-based employment eligibility verification system operated by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Learn more about the E-Verify program.

The salary range reflects figures based on the primary location, which is listed first. The actual range for the role may differ based on the location of the role. In addition to salary, U.S. Bank offers a comprehensive benefits package, including incentive and recognition programs, equity stock purchase 401(k) contribution and pension (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). Pay Range: $149,515.00 - $175,900.00

U.S. Bank will consider qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records for employment. U.S. Bank conducts background checks consistent with applicable local laws, including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance and the California Fair Chance Act as well as the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance. U.S. Bank is subject to, and conducts background checks consistent with the requirements of Section 19 of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act (FDIA). In addition, certain positions may also be subject to the requirements of FINRA, NMLS registration, Reg Z, Reg G, OFAC, the NFA, the FCPA, the Bank Secrecy Act, the SAFE Act,