Job Description
Technical Leader
Location: Leicester
Department: Technical
Reports to: Quality Manager
About Europe Snacks
At Europe Snacks, we want to be a great place to work. We do that by making sure our values of Entrepreneurship, Excellence and Care sit at the heart of everything we do. We’re now looking for a Technical Leader to join our Leicester site and help drive food safety, quality, hygiene and compliance performance across the business.
The opportunity
This is a fantastic opportunity for an experienced technical professional who enjoys working in a fast-paced food manufacturing environment and wants to make a genuine impact.
As Technical Leader, you’ll be part of the day-based Technical Team, supporting departmental objectives and site performance targets. You’ll play a key role in maintaining compliance, driving standards, coaching others, supporting investigations and helping to embed continuous improvement across the factory.
Key responsibilities
Food safety, quality and compliance
* Support compliance activity across site and help drive corrective actions through to completion
* Lead and maintain traceability routine testing
* Review and police line paperwork to ensure adherence and completion in real time
* Ensure lines are positively released back to production using defined swabbing schemes through QATs
* Carry out audits to schedule, including glass and hard plastic, bait box, GMP and internal audits
* Ensure site adherence to customer-specific quality assurance standards
* Conduct and analyse QA board testing and trending to identify key areas for improvement
* Ensure raw materials have approved specifications and packaging film is signed off before launches
Leadership and people
* Work across all shifts to ensure employees understand and follow best practice
* Coach and mentor QAT and QC staff to improve standards and capability
* Educate and promote food safety and technical standards across operational teams
* Lead by example on safe working practices and expected behaviours
* Build strong relationships with internal stakeholders, customers and auditors
Customer, reporting and issue management
* Understand the main issues impacting your area during the previous 24 hours
* Report NCRs daily and support closure of actions
* Communicate quality or compliance concerns promptly to shift management and the wider management team
* Support customer quality control visits and liaise professionally where required
Continuous improvement and problem solving
* Take corrective action where product is not meeting specification
* Support and lead root cause analysis to prevent repeat issues
* Escalate recurring issues appropriately
* Be actively involved in continuous improvement projects and quality initiatives
* Help develop SOPs, manuals, procedures and defined standards to improve consistency and performance
Hygiene, safety and site standards
* Maintain strong food safety and health and safety standards within your area
* Ensure PPE is worn correctly at all times
* Ensure equipment is cleaned in line with relevant CICs and SOPs and that the QA Lab is kept clean
* Drive site hygiene standards, including supporting the creation and training of cleaning cards alongside the Hygiene Supervisor
* Take part in weekly GMP audits with Area and Shift Managers
* Carry out regular line walks to identify foreign body risks and hygiene improvement opportunities
* Support supply and replenishment of chemicals, consumables and waste management to avoid shortages
About you
To be successful in this role, you’ll need to be a credible and proactive technical professional who can build trust, influence others and stay calm under pressure.
You’ll likely have:
* Experience in a technical, QA or food safety role within food manufacturing
* Good working knowledge of GMP, HACCP, traceability and internal auditing
* Experience supporting corrective actions, investigations and root cause analysis
* The confidence to challenge standards constructively and hold the line where needed
* Strong interpersonal and communication skills
* A collaborative approach and the ability to work effectively across departments and shifts
* Strong IT skills, including Word, Excel and PowerPoint
* Report-writing experience, ideally including technical specifications and complaint investigations
Desirable qualifications
* Literacy/Numeracy to National Standard Level 2
* Level 3 Food Hygiene
* Level 3 HACCP
* Train the Trainer qualification
Personal qualities we’re looking for
We’re looking for someone who:
* Leads with credibility, maturity and calmness under pressure
* Gives timely, constructive feedback and communicates openly
* Works collaboratively while knowing when to support, challenge or push back
* Is resilient, adaptable and positive about change
* Can inspire others through encouragement, support and high standards
* Brings energy, initiative and an improvement-focused mindset
* Champions equality, diversity and inclusion
* Embodies customer focus and follows through on commitments
* Is passionate about technical leadership and continuous improvement
Why join us?
This is more than a technical role, it’s an opportunity to influence standards, support people, and help shape the future of quality and food safety on site. You’ll join a values-led business where your contribution matters and where you’ll have the chance to make a visible difference every day.
Please note this role is not with sponsorship.