Director of R&D - Bakery

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Manage all necessary channels of communication to facilitate customer needs and create a culture of urgency within the R&D Department.
• Coach, mentor, and develop the R&D staff.
• Maintain a high awareness of consumers, technical trends, and new developments in the food industry, with a strong emphasis on baking.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Purchasing, Operations, and Marketing to execute scale-up and long-term planning.
• Serve as a technical liaison between Sales and Customers.
• Work with the Purchasing Department on Vendor Approval and Sourcing Alternate Raw Materials.
• Pursue Product Improvement Opportunities with short- and long-term benefits, including cost savings or efficiencies in operations.
• Provide consistent guidance as a technical leader regarding solving technical, processing, and ingredient issues. Evaluate current and future technologies for recommending process improvements for cost savings and/or product improvement.
• Facilitate cross-functional teams (marketing, sales, R&D) to integrate technical and culinary strengths in product development, with a strong consumer and customer focus.
• Execute a highly disciplined innovation process with a focus on commercial feasibility.

QUALIFICATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS:

• Bachelor of Science in Food Science, Food Engineering, Chemistry, or a similar agricultural discipline.
• 10-15 years of product development or closely related experience in the food industry (bakery manufacturing), with 5 or more years of direct management of a large technical group.
• Experience with setting annual budgets, tracking and controlling expenses, and overall financial management of a technical department/group consisting of both personnel and technical components.
• Academic food science knowledge with product development, new technology creation, and food manufacturing experience of bakery products.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite with an emphasis on SharePoint, Excel, and Word.
• Ability to read and write correspondence that uses technical/scientific terminology.
• Ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships with all contacts inside and outside of the company, with strong interpersonal and organizational skills.
• Proven Bakery or Functional Ingredient experience.
• This role would be expected to travel up to 25% of the time.