Company Profile: A UK flexible packaging manufacturer who supplies packaging for household names, including products for all the main supermarket chains. They are now looking to recruit a Head of food Science and Technical Title: Head of food Science and Technical Salary: Circa £60,000 Purpose of job: To provide site based technical leadership across the technical department and Food science laboratory. This role will report directly to the Technical Director to lend support and ensure development of added value products via technical application and/or food science technology. This role will ensure that both departments under their leadership are aligned with the company strategy, lending technical support to site / other departments with a focus on continuous improvement, product development & enhancement, leading to increased productivity, sales growth, cost down initiatives and product development. Key Accountabilities: This role requires a strategic and hands-on approach which is vital to growth and improved profitability within the organization. Direct Responsibility for the management, personal development, and leadership of the sites Technical and food science departments. Develop strong effective working relationships within the management team to ensure business/site objectives are being met by your departments. Further develop existing team members to become a highly performing, multi-skilled team who can proactively support the company to achieve their objectives and meet our Horizon 2025 targets. Work directly with the Technical Director to ensure all projects, actions, and tasks, including testing and developments trials, are progressing efficiently through the company. Ensure all TRD/TRL trials are supported Technically, with reports produced to capture results/actions. Become the first escalation point there for any site based technical queries or actions. Ensure that all products bought, manufactured, and sold within the company are compliant with current EU and UK Food Contact & Food Safety legislation. Conduct regular meetings with the team to ensure they are working against the latest compliance guidance. Each year helps to build a RDEC TAX claim against any trials and developments across your departments. Work closely with northwest Technical Manager to ensure both sites are aligned technically on both film development and site capabilities. Interact with” external” technical team to monitor, support and drive all their projects and trials through the company, to minimize delays. Monitor and ensure all monthly site-based reporting is submitted on time and in full. Attend / support required meetings. Technical, Sales, Monthly Management meetings and Steer Co. Proactively drive projects and trials through your team to ensure they receive the necessary focus, ensuring they achieve the results against set timelines. Provide Technical support and leadership across other site-based departments when required, such as Procurement, Operations, QA, etc. Produce a Monthly report for the technical director (based on Team reports into you) to update activity and progression within your team, this report will also be used to update site. Ensure your teams project trackers, EQMS and monthly updates are kept up to date and capture all relevant information and data. Support site with the creation of “right first time” packaging solutions to meet our customer / site requirements. Drive a culture of safety and compliance across both Departments. Interact with Field Tech services in regard to offering customer trial support or complaint investigation. Assist QA with Technical based issues or customer complaints. Conduct customer visits if requested to lend technical support. Perform other duties not written above as prescribed by the Technical Director Skills & Competences: Must have 5 Years of experience of managing a team or department of people. Have excellent communication, leadership, and organizational skills. Must have experience of Project management and development process. Ideally a degree qualified in either management, Chemistry or a Science based discipline. Able to create management reports and presentations that will update, track and inform. Must be Computer literate and familiar with all major software programs. Have a car license as some travelling across the company or customer sites may be required. Experience gained within Packaging, Print and Conversion would be advantageous. Personal attributes: Self-motivated, high energy and have an air of Gravitas. Be Flexible and adaptable and able to work in a fast-moving dynamic environment. Have excellent problem solving and decision-making skills. Ability to prioritise and manage timelines. Ability to communicate across all different levels of people. Able to work independently or as part of a wider team Experience And Additional Requirements: In addition, you should be able to demonstrate the following behaviours and skills: - Customer-centric, easy to work with and flexible Sharing information with all relevant parties (internal & external) to improve ways of working to deliver customer satisfaction. Demonstrates a collective use of all communications tools/business systems to ensure that the tools in place are being utilised to benefit the business/customer. Understands the market they trade in and the arena in which they compete to ensure that they retain a USP. Takes an objective view on internal/external situations and looks for ways to improve the service. Intensity & Speed Commercially aware of how the role influences the commercial performance of the business. Organises workload to ensure that they operate in the most efficient way. Ability to meet deadlines under pressure whilst ensuring that they strive for efficiency. Ability to follow systems and processes to deliver an efficient end result. Proactively looks for better ways of doing things. Empowerment & Accountability Willingness to adapt to business requirements and takes the time to understand business change. Expresses spoken and written ideas effectively in individual and group situations. Proactive approach and not afraid to make decisions. Ability to focus on and achieve personal and team objectives. Contributes to the overall purpose of the team and take the times to understand the objectives Demonstrate a good understanding of business purpose and direction. Contributes ideas to develop and enhance the offer. Not afraid to share knowledge to improve ways of working for all. Relishes the challenge of change and encourages others to do the same and explains the benefits of change convincingly to their team, identifies any barriers to change and how to overcome them. Demonstrates commitment and a passion to succeed Passionate and enthusiastic commitment to shared goals and objectives. Dedication and determination to the success of the team, business, and client Commitment to training and development and making the team the team the best they can be. Demonstrates has listened through their actions which are visible and understood by others. Integrity & fairness always Trust, appreciation, and respect of, and for, team members Also ensuring and promoting equality and fairness, following the company policies regarding Dignity at Work. Supporting an open and honest environment for discussion and feedback Understands your and other role(s) within the team and company. Contributes positively to team identity. Builds and maintains team spirit and morale to ensure effective working relationships. Encourages the mantra and treats people as they would want to be treated. Safe Environment for everyone Supports a safe working environment. Encourages a greater awareness of safety by ensuring team are trained on safety. Actively encourages team members to engage with other departments to assess safety through risk assessment and Area Safety Inspections Balances the workload to ensure that specific areas of workload are addressed. Additional benefits: Pension: 6% EE, 3% ER Annual Leave: 25 days, plus bank holidays (increasing by 1 day each January to a maximum of 28 days plus bank holidays) Medicash scheme –our employees are covered for contributions towards, dental treatment, both accidental and routine, specialist diagnostic tests and scans, and even complimentary therapies. For a small monthly fee, you can also add your partner and children to the scheme. Salary sacrifice Pension – Access to Salary sacrifice pension scheme or as above. Members of the pension scheme are also provided with the details of an independent financial advisor upon commencement of their employment should they wish to contact them at any time, in addition the independent financial advisors come to the site a few times a year to provide face to face advice for individuals. Company sick pay scheme – Dependent on successful probation Enhanced Maternity / Paternity pay – dependent on length of service EAP Scheme – 24 / 7 counselling and advice on issues such as Financial, relationship issues, health issues etc. Benefits Hub – employees have exclusive access to Benefit Hub’s discount marketplace which includes discount codes, cashback, money off and more. Free parking onsite