Chief of Staff

fairlife • Chicago, IL

7d • $170,000 - $195,000 • Onsite

About The Position

The Chief of Staff serves as a strategic partner to the fairlife CEO, driving business planning and governance, strengthening operational routines and standards, and advancing key enterprise initiatives. This role ensures clarity, alignment, and disciplined execution across the organization. The Chief of Staff also acts as an integrator across the Executive Leadership Team (ELT), enabling agile ways of working and elevating internal and external communications, including fairlife's reporting relationship with Coca-Cola , to support fairlife's growth and long-term strategy.

Requirements

• Minimum 7–10 years of professional experience, ideally including time in CPG, food & beverage, or another large, matrixed corporate environment — experience operating inside a parent-company or joint-venture structure is a plus.
• Proven experience in strategic planning, program/project management, or a similar chief-of-staff, business-operations, or management-consulting role.
• Strong business and financial acumen, with the ability to synthesize complex information into clear, CEO-ready briefs and recommendations.
• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with experience developing executive, board, and enterprise-wide messaging.
• Sound judgment and discretion in handling highly confidential and strategically sensitive information.
• Demonstrated ability to build trust and influence without direct authority across a senior executive team.
• Experience facilitating agile or similarly disciplined ways of working across cross-functional teams.
• Bachelor's degree required; MBA or other advanced degree preferred.

Nice To Haves

• experience operating inside a parent-company or joint-venture structure is a plus.
• MBA or other advanced degree preferred.

Responsibilities

• Partner with the CEO and executive team in the annual and multi-year business planning process, ensuring alignment with fairlife's strategic priorities.
• Establish governance routines that drive accountability, transparency, and timely decision-making across the enterprise.
• Partner with the CEO and ELT to monitor progress against strategic goals, surfacing risks, dependencies, and opportunities for executive action.
• Prepare CEO-level briefs, insights, and recommendations to support informed, high-impact decisions.
• Own the cadence and content for board- and parent-company-level reporting, ensuring fairlife's performance and narrative are clearly and consistently represented to Coca-Cola leadership.
• Build and maintain routines and standards for operational excellence, ensuring consistency, efficiency, and clarity across functions.
• Oversee high-priority initiatives on behalf of the CEO, ensuring they are scoped, resourced, sequenced, and executed effectively.
• Own a portfolio of CEO-sponsored special projects and cross-functional initiatives with clear accountability for scoping, milestones, and outcomes.
• Identify and remove operational bottlenecks, enabling teams to move faster and with greater alignment.
• Act as a trusted advisor to the CEO and ELT members, helping them navigate enterprise priorities and interdependencies.
• Anticipate needs, prepare the CEO for key engagements, and ensure they have the right information at the right time.
• Serve as a proxy for the CEO in select meetings, ensuring continuity of leadership and decision-making.
• Serve as connective tissue across the ELT, ensuring alignment, clarity of priorities, and consistent follow-through.
• Facilitate agile ways of working, enabling faster iteration, cross-functional collaboration, and enterprise problem-solving.
• Drive ELT meeting agendas, materials, and outcomes, ensuring disciplined execution and clear communication of decisions.
• Partner with the General Counsel, CFO and QSE leadership on enterprise risk, compliance, and governance-calendar items — including audit committee and SOX-readiness milestones — to keep the ELT ahead of key obligations.
• Partner with the CHRO on talent reviews, succession planning, and organizational health as a standing part of the ELT rhythm.
• Partner with PACS, People & Culture, and other functions to help craft messaging for town halls, ELT updates, board/steering committee materials, and external engagements.
• Ensure the CEO's voice, priorities, and expectations are clearly communicated across the organization.
• Build strong relationships across fairlife and with key external partners to support enterprise visibility and influence.
• Build a network across the NAOU PMO community and support wiring into key NAOU routines, including necessary content and follow-ups.

Benefits

• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage, effective day one!
• Supplemental health plans (hospital indemnity, accident, and critical illness insurance)
• Paid Time Off to recharge and support work-life balance
• Paid parental leave & adoption assistance (up to $10,000)
• Parental support & family care benefits, including childcare resources and lactation support
• 401(k) to support retirement planning with up to 9% in employer match
• Wellness reimbursement (up to $500 for qualified wellbeing expenses)
• Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for emotional wellbeing and work-life support
• Company-paid life insurance and short-term disability
• Employer HSA funding (for HDHP participants)
• Tuition reimbursement (up to $10,000) and student loan repayment ($200/month)
• Learning & development programs to unlock your full potential
• Rewards & recognition, matching gifts, free product, and Business Resource Groups

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior