Customer Quality Technical Manager

Kettle Cuisine•Savage, MD

About The Position

The Customer Quality Technical Manager leads customer-facing technical support for Kettle Cuisine. The role coordinates routine product sampling, testing, trials, audits, and technical requirements. Based in Savage, Maryland, the manager partners with Technical Services and supervises East and West technicians while coordinating customer feedback with internal teams. The manager ensures work and documentation are completed on time, are traceable, and receive appropriate review. The role also develops team members, promotes accountability and performance, supports the company’s safety culture and core values, and drives quality assurance and continuous improvement. It requires managing time-sensitive requests, building relationships with customers, suppliers, and internal stakeholders, and providing after-hours support for critical issues when required.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in food science, food technology, quality, or a related field; equivalent relevant experience may be considered.
At least four years of food-manufacturing technical, quality, laboratory, or customer-support experience, including project or team coordination responsibilities.
Experience coordinating product samples, testing, sensory or production trials, audit support, or technical-document workflows.
Strong planning, prioritization, documentation, customer-service, and cross-functional communication skills.
Ability to travel among assigned sites and manage time-sensitive requests.
Self-directed, with high integrity and sound judgment.
Able to build strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders, suppliers, and team members.
Strong project-management, analytical, statistical, and problem-solving skills.
Comfortable working at a fast pace and in ambiguous environments.
Enthusiasm for food and ability to provide after-hours support for critical issues when required.
Demonstrated ability to drive continuous improvement and manage to and achieve metrics.
Willingness to address difficult situations directly, with patience and respect.

Nice To Haves

Familiarity with sample traceability and controlled documentation.

Responsibilities

Triage customer technical requests and define their scope, sample details, owner, deliverable, and due date.
Coordinate testing, sensory evaluations, trials, audits, and post-launch sample reviews with technicians, site FSQ, and Technical Services.
Lead East and West technician workloads and standardize sample handling, testing, traceability, and recordkeeping.
Coordinate sample collection, analysis, shipping, and documentation for supplier investigations and material changes.
Route customer and audit documents to designated subject-matter owners for review and approval.
Track requests and results, and escalate out-of-specification findings, customer risks, and delays.
Plan work, track results, and resolve issues.
Develop individual team members and their careers, and foster accountability and performance.
Drive quality assurance and continuous improvement.
Model and support Kettle Cuisine’s Core Values and safety culture.