Cost Champion

The Cost Champion is the leader responsible for embedding a cost-obsessed mindset across the full offer lifecycle. He/she will ensure cost being a central decision criterion from the value proposition to design and supply chain, with relevant governance requirement. This role contributes to drive profitable growth through innovation projects, to restore competitiveness through legacy product cost productivity, and to upgrade methods, tools and skills to make cost leadership initiative sustainable across the organization.

The position covers the full offer lifecycle, from new offer creation to legacy offers:

• For new offers, the role ensures target cost is defined from the earliest stages, implementing Design-to-Cost methodologies as part of OLM process and stage-gate governance.
• For legacy offers, the role ensures Divisions actively manage offer cost competitiveness, build a strong pipeline of productivity actions, including product re-design-to-cost initiatives based on margin, competitiveness and/or customer value gaps.

This role is both strategic and operational. It acts as a Design-to-Cost champion, cost workshop leader, and cost leader PMO, coordinating Divisions, hubs, and GSC to prioritize the right offers, deploy the right methods, and secure disciplined execution.

The Cost Champion acts as the central leader and animator of the Cost Officer community across Divisions. While divisional Cost Officers remain accountable for local costing activities—including cost consolidation, analysis, database integrity, and day-to-day cost monitoring within their perimeter—the Cost Champion ensures alignment with the central Offer Cost Leadership strategy, common methodologies, governance expectations, and cross-divisional priorities.

• Key Responsibilities Act as the focal point to define, prioritize, and execute offer cost action plans for assigned division(s) / hub(s), in alignment with Offer Cost Leadership priorities and governance.

Drive the offer cost leadership agenda across offer lifecycle (both new offers and legacy offers):

• Ensure cost is on everyone’s agenda by cascading the program across all functions through communication, webinars, trainings, and business rituals. Cost needs to become everyone’s concern rather than a specialist activity.
• Coordinate with Divisions, hubs, and GSC to ensure consistency of practice.

Lead Design-to-Cost methodologies

• Deploy target cost calculation methodologies based on customer value, UVP, market expectations, and willingness to pay across the assigned division(s).
• Deploy and use should-cost methodologies to provide fact-based cost transparency at system, sub-system, and component level.
• Run (Re-) Design-to-Cost E2E project and deploy the methodology across assigned Division(s), ensuring it is embedded at each OLM milestone/stage-gate.

Animate methods & tools ecosystem and its governance:

• Deploy a systematic, automated, end-to-end cost tracking approach based on integrated tools and reliable data.
• Implement and animate the use of key cost tools (such as should-cost/benchmark/ teardown).
• Embed cost metrics and decision checkpoints into OLM governance and performance reviews, including visibility of deviations and action plans in QBRs and strategic deep dives.
• Drive the sharing and replication of best practices, lessons learned, and successful cost optimization approaches across Divisions, hubs, and product lines through the cost officer community.

Core skills and expertise

• Solid understanding of product cost structure
• Strong ability to define and challenge target cost and should-cost using reliable assumptions and fact-based costing methodologies.
• Analytical skills to drive facts & figures decisions

Leadership and change-management capabilities

• Strong change management…