Head of Technical Services – Food Ingredients/Flavors

Kinsa is recruiting for a:  Head of Technical Services
Location: Cleveland, OH Area

Mission:
Our client, a producer of premium ingredients and flavors for food processors, is looking for a Head of Technical Services to add to their team.  In this role you’ll have overall responsibility for the Product Industrialization & Product Scale Up function for the United States and Canadian markets supporting both the core (fruit) and beyond (beverage, ice cream) business units. 

Successful candidates MUST HAVE experience in a food processing plant environment (and/or other singular qualifier under Competencies/Culture below).

Compensation/Benefits:                                                                         

• Compensation: 130-160k
• Additional bonus opportunity
• Medical, Dental, Vision
• Paid Vacation/Holidays
• Retirement Benefits
• Relocation Assistance

What you’ll be responsible for:

• Follow AFUS Product Commercialization Process
• Ensure new and existing products meet Customers, Business & Regulatory requirements across AFUS
• Ensure the Tech Service Team successfully develops the processes required to produce the new products assuring proper set up, scale up and structure. 
• Work closely with NPD on product formulation, Engineering on technology design & selection, Quality on product specs and process parameters and US Plants on scale up and operations. 
• Establish and maintain SOP for Technical Services personnel to assure product standardization across AFUS. 
• Monitor existing product performance and optimize the products on an ongoing basis.
• Ensure product trials are managed properly, and the products meets the expected requirements in terms of quality, compliance to targeted specifications, costs and timelines. 
• Work with Operations to optimize, validate and commission formulations, processes, and manufacturing equipment by reviewing on an ongoing basis, formulas and processes and support plant equipment trials using all the relevant scientific skills, expertise and knowledge acquired.
• Enforce industrialization procedure to the effect of launching feasible, reliable, and productive products
• Maintain processing tools to ensure consistency of approach for industrializing new products.
• Work with R&D to make sure the Developers use the right formulation tools when creating new products formulations.
• Review launched products performance with plants on an on-going basis to ensure they give optimum performance support
• Implement relevant corrective actions to ensure product performance is maximized.
• Implement group policies, ISO 9000 quality systems, FSSC 22000, HACCP, and continuous improvement by setting up and participating to appropriate task forces.

Competencies/Culture:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Food Science, Food Engineering or related field
• Experience taking products from the bench to commercialization with strong formulation and scale up for plant production
• Experienced leading a team of technical supervisors/managers
• Project Management experience
• Experience in operations, quality assurance, quality control, regulatory, labeling requirements
• Experience working with dairy products specifically made for the foodservice industry
• Strong scientific knowledge of ingredients and their interactions: thickening and gelling agents, colours, flavouring ingredients, fruits, sweeteners, dairy and functional ingredients
• Experience with fluid or beverage processing
• Member or working knowledge of AFUS

Referrals are our best source for the top talent our clients need so if you know of anyone with these skills in the food and beverage industry, please pass me their name and email/phone number, or share this job posting with them. Kinsa pays referral bonuses if someone you refer gets hired by our client!

Check out our other food and beverage industry career opportunities at https://kinsa.com/food-beverage-industry-jobs/.
 

Recruiter Information:
Rob Navarro
RobN@kinsa.com