Global Innovation Manager - FMCG

Job description / Role

Global Innovation Manager - Oils, Fats and Culinary/Condiments will be responsible for the end-end Innovation Development and Management of major Oils, Fats and Culinary Brands and a key innovation partners for these business Groups. A vital member of the Global Marketing Development Team, he/she will be fully responsible for shaping the global innovation strategy, identifying new consumer opportunities, developing and testing consumer concepts, working hand in hand with the R&D Director to develop new products, build business cases with the BU teams, and launch these global NPDs across regions. He/she will work closely with Business Unit CEOs and R&D teams to build 5 generation innovation pipelines and with the Ops teams to launch and monitor the performance of top innovations world-wide. The role is based at the companies' global head office in the UAE and requires up-to 40% travel.

The Global Innovation Manager - Oils, Fats and Culinary/Condiments will come into a significant Innovation leadership role for his her Business Units with the following key responsibilities:

Innovation Strategy and Ideation (Leads):
* Works closely with Businesses and Consumer Insights to identify and size consumer need-states and motivational segments to identify opportunity areas.
* Identifies future trends and maps them into business needs and opportunities
* Sizes opportunity areas for each of the business.
* Responsible for running ideation and concept development workshops and coming up with ideas
* Develops the 5-year innovation roadmap for Bus integrated with the BU budgets

Innovation Feasibility (Leads/Supports CEO's and Director - Product Development):
* Responsible for working closely with R&D to identify product ideas that can be translated into innovations.
* Briefs Marketing Development team and/or Business units to develop packaging design and creative marketing for New Products.
* Develops and screens innovation concepts and products (qualitative).
* Works with R&D to produce prototypes.
* Carries our Consumer Product Tests with Consumer Insight and R&D to assess preference.
* Runs Quantitative tests of concepts to decide on launch volumes.

Innovation Implementation (Supports):
* Supports Global Marketing development team on ATL and Digital Marketing development of NPD.
* Supports Regional Marketing Activation teams to set-up Marketing execution.
* Rolls-out leading Group Innovation processes and tools across markets.

Innovation Planning and Tracking (Leads/Supports CEO's and Director-Product Development):
* Is the key interface with the CEO's and Ops team on NPD planning and execution.
* Is key interface for R&D and BU's to run the end to end end-end NPD process.
* With Central HOM and Bus, is responsible for NPD project prioritization across OFC.
* Supports the development of the Annual NPD Project and execution plan and budgets with Markets and R&D.
* Supports BU Marketing teams on NPD implementation and post-launch performance tracking approaches.

Reporting Relationship:
* This role will be part of the Global CMO Organization and report directly into the Global Head of Marketing Development - Oils, Fats and Culinary/Condiments. He/she will have a dotted line relationship into the Director-Product Development and the Business Unit CEOs. He/she will have working line with the Global Marketing Manager, Global Consumer Insight Manager and Global Marketing Capabilities and Communication Manager, who will be peers based in HQ. He/she will also be responsible for steering external innovation partners based world-wide.

Role Key Performance Indicators:
* Incremental Sales contribution through new products.
* Power Brand Innovation Initiatives delivered into Business Units as per agreed plans.
* 5-Generation Innovation & Renovation pipeline for all major brands built into Market plans
* Best-in-class innovation processes implemented in the OFC businesses

Requirements

* Educated to MBA or BBA from a top-tier business school.
* They will have had 8-10 Years of hands on end to end innovation management experience in FMCG as part of a Marketing team.
* A strong international marketing innovation background, he/she would have successfully identified big consumer opportunities, developed consumer insight-driven concepts and developed and launched outstanding new products across markets.
* Incumbent would have led ideation and concept development sessions with multi-functional teams and built innovation and renovation and innovation business cases and implemented them with Bus.
* A self-starter who is able to mobilize and inspire teams, the incumbent will have the ability to think out of the box.
* He/she will be an exemplary team player with the ability to influence teams in difficult circumstances.
* He/she will have strong commercial acumen and the ability to translate innovation ideas into business plans and launches.
* Strong project management skills and excellent verbal and written communication skills are a must.
* Experience in FMCG or Home and Personal Care/Luxury is a plus.
* Experience in Foods is preferred.

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