Our client is a leading snack food manufacturer. They currently have an opportunity for a Senior Food Scientist at their facility in the Northeast. The candidate will be responsible for leading all aspects of new product development from concept to commercialization. This individual will work closely with several cross-functional groups including manufacturing, procurement, packaging, sales, and marketing.
Essential Functions and Responsibilities
- Designs, develops, conducts and/or reviews experiments (e.g., laboratory or process experiments) to deliver new products.
- Evaluates ingredient and product efficacy, claims and safety.
- Evaluates new ingredients, materials, products and/or processes.
- Successfully applies scientific, engineering and consumer insights principles in research, formulation, processing, and commercialization of snacks.
- Identifies, evaluates, and selects new ingredients, developments, trends and technologies in food and beverage industry to guide product development initiatives.
- Runs pilot scale equipment with knowledge of various plant unit operations and processes.
- Performs plant trials from initial planning through execution and scale-up.
- Analyzes ingredients, finished products or other substances using laboratory instruments. This includes preparation of analytical standards and standard curves.
- Uses and applies knowledge of Good Laboratory Practices (e.g., handling of chemicals and glassware, preparation of standards and reagents, proper measuring techniques, data management, housekeeping).
- Develops, maintains and/or validates laboratory test methods or equipment (sampling, monitoring, analytical procedures) to ensure reliability and accuracy of analytical results.
- Writes detailed and accurate reports for analyses, experiments, and projects
- Responsible for quality and food safety tasks for their position.
- Scouts new technologies, processes and partners to help drive the business, meeting new consumer and business needs
- Works with management and fellow associates to ensure Food Safety programs are followed.
- Performs other duties as assigned that will impact and support the overall outcome of the company and department objectives.
Required Knowledge, Skills and Abilities
- Bachelor’s Degree: A Bachelor’s degree in food science, chemistry, chemical engineering is preferred.
- Demonstrated leadership and team building competencies.
- Project management and complex problem-solving abilities.
- Excellent communication, interpersonal skills, and people management skills.
- Able to be self-directed, forward thinking and make complex decisions that drive business innovation and performance.
- Deep ability to exercise design of experiments, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills.
- Excellent verbal and written communications skills.
- Comfort with presenting findings/data to senior leadership.
- Excellent time and project management skills with proven ability to manage and prioritize multiple, concurrent projects.
Office environment with regulated temperature. Position will require an ability to sit, talk or hear for frequently long periods of time. Bend and reach with hands and arms. Daily lifting and/or ability to move up to 10 pounds and infrequently up to 25 pounds. Manual dexterity and coordination are required to perform the work using a personal computer and various software programs, calculator, phone, copy and fax machines and other related tools and equipment.
All Candidates must be able to work in the U.S. without sponsorship.
For more information, please contact Moira McGrath at OPUS International, Inc. at (954) 428-3888 or moira@foodscience.com