Inside Colgate’s Analytics Playbook with Moitree Rahman

Moitree Rahman is the Associate Director of Digital Measurement at Colgate-Palmolive, where she plays a key role in the company’s push toward digital transformation. While many know Colgate for toothpaste, the brand spans much more, covering Pet Care, Home Care, and Personal Care products across over 200 markets.

Since joining in 2020, Moitree has worked on Colgate’s global digital team, a group created to help shift the business toward digital-first strategies. Her focus is measurement, building the frameworks, KPIs, and tech guidance needed to understand what’s working across CRM, search, social, and digital commerce. She also advises on marketing tech investments and helps the company choose the right partners to keep pace with consumer behavior shifts.

So read on, this is how Moitree builds and leads a cross-functional analytics strategy inside one of the world’s most recognized consumer brands.

Why Analytics Is a Cross-Functional Effort

Analytics isn’t a solo act, it’s a team sport. Moitree explains that success depends on blending business knowledge with technical skills. Business leaders bring the problem to the table. Tech teams build the tools to solve it. And analytics connects the dots in between.

At Colgate, IT, digital, and analytics teams work side by side. Each plays a role, from defining use cases to setting up infrastructure. But here’s the key: everyone needs to understand why they’re doing what they’re doing. Without that shared understanding, execution suffers.

That’s why Colgate forms cross-functional steering committees, mixing business and tech experts. These groups work together early, before any tool is bought or solution is built, so they stay aligned on both the problem and the outcome.

So read on—because collaboration isn’t optional, it’s the foundation. And when it works, it speeds up everything.

The Importance of Translators Between Business and Tech

Moitree makes it clear that projects fall apart when business and tech teams don’t speak the same language. You can have smart people on both sides, but without someone in the middle translating, things get lost.

That’s why she pushes for hybrid team members—people who understand the business problem and can break it down into technical actions. These “multilingual” teammates don’t just smooth communication. They keep projects on track, reduce guesswork, and help everyone stay aligned.

At Colgate, Moitree plays that role herself, often sitting in both business strategy meetings and technical syncs. She ensures the teams don’t just hear each other—they actually understand each other.

Let me explain—great tools and smart people aren’t enough. You need someone in the middle to connect the dots.

How Moitree Works Across Teams

Moitree doesn’t just set measurement strategy—she’s deeply involved in making sure it works on the ground. She collaborates with data engineers, analysts, and visualization experts to turn business goals into working solutions. With a strong analytics background herself, she knows how to speak their language and troubleshoot issues before they slow things down.

But she didn’t stop there. She also helps manage vendor relationships, sitting in on calls to ensure external partners understand what the business actually needs. Her presence helps align everyone, from global IT to local market teams, so solutions are useful, scalable, and realistic.

Let me explain. Execution doesn’t happen in isolation. Moitree tracks each part of the process—who’s building what, what the tech offers, and whether it solves the right problem. Her role is part strategist, part translator, part operator. And that mix is what keeps projects moving in the right direction.

Picking the Right Tools and the Right People

At Colgate, the global team doesn’t just pick tools—they evaluate whether local teams can actually use them. Moitree looks beyond features and pricing. She asks: Is this scalable? Will local markets have the right people to make it work?

The goal isn’t to stack tools—it’s to solve real business problems without overwhelming the teams who have to run them. That means choosing platforms that work across regions, offer support when internal headcount is limited, and come with services that teams can tap into quickly.

Let me explain. A good tool is useless if no one can run it. That’s why Moitree factors in people and process, not just technology. Sometimes that means leaning on vendor support. Sometimes it means saying no to tools that add complexity without value.

Here comes the good part—by focusing on adoption, not hype, her team delivers tools that get used, not ignored.

When to Hire vs. When to Partner

Moitree doesn’t treat every skill gap the same. If the work involves sensitive data, needs tight coordination, or demands speed, she leans toward hiring internally. Having someone in-house offers more control, quicker turnaround, and tighter data protection.

But she didn’t stop there. For shorter-term needs or specialized skills that are hard to find, like deep analytics expertise for a one-off project, external partners make more sense. They can step in fast without the overhead of onboarding or long-term commitments.

Let me explain. Not every problem justifies a new headcount. Sometimes it's smarter to scale through partners who already know the tools and can help deliver right away. That balance between internal stability and flexible support is how Moitree keeps the team agile without stretching it too thin.

Matching Skills to Analytics Needs

Moitree doesn’t start by hiring titles—she starts by asking, “What problem are we solving?” That guides whether she needs an analyst, a data scientist, or an external partner. For descriptive work like trend analysis or performance reporting, a solid analyst is enough. No need to over-engineer the solution.

But when the task involves unstructured data, predictive modeling, or campaign optimization, she looks for someone with deeper technical skills—someone who can clean raw data, build models, and tie the results back to business outcomes. These are the moments that call for data scientists or engineers who understand the mess behind the metrics.

Let me explain. She’s not just filling roles—she’s building capability. And that means more than technical know-how. The best hires understand how their work moves the business. Moitree also thinks about career growth: advanced talent needs a path, not just a project. If they can’t see how their skills evolve into strategy, it’s hard to keep them engaged long-term.

So read on—matching skills to work isn’t about a job description. It’s about knowing what’s needed today, what’s coming tomorrow, and who can grow with you along the way.

How to Prepare for a Privacy-First Future

Privacy isn’t a future concern—it’s already here. Moitree and her team at Colgate are actively working on it. With third-party cookies fading out, the focus has shifted to collecting and using first-party data the right way.

Let me explain. This means more than just having the data. Colgate wants to build trust by giving people clear choices—opt in, opt out, or ask for more info. They make sure every touchpoint reflects that value exchange.

But there's more. As a global company, Colgate operates in regions with strict privacy laws like GDPR. So the team isn’t reacting—they’re setting up systems now to meet those standards across all markets. Moitree’s team is helping design those systems, from consent tracking to how data is stored and used.

This isn’t just about compliance. It’s about owning the relationship with the customer, and doing it in a way that’s transparent and future-proof.

Conclusion

Moitree Rahman’s work at Colgate-Palmolive shows what modern analytics leadership really looks like—clear, connected, and grounded in business impact. She bridges strategy and execution, business and tech, global needs and local realities. Her focus isn’t on chasing the latest tools—it’s on solving the right problems, with the right people, at the right time.

It’s not flashy, not theoretical. It’s practical, people-centered, and built to last. And that’s exactly what makes it work.