Senior Director-Innovation & Insights

Ergon, Inc•Flowood, MS

15h

About The Position

Ergon, Inc. is seeking a strategic and hands-on Senior Director, Innovation & Insights to lead its enterprise innovation capability. This role establishes a disciplined, data-led, collaborative system that turns segment knowledge, technical capability, and market insight into measurable organic growth. It leads a small corporate Center of Excellence that serves and facilitates innovation across segments, while segments retain ownership of execution and results. The position also owns enterprise foresight and long-term opportunity assessment. The Senior Director builds enterprise innovation strategy aligned with organic-growth priorities; establishes visibility into the innovation pipeline, timing, value, and risk; develops shared stage-gate and prioritization processes; and defines innovation scorecards and reporting for the Executive Leadership Team and Board. The role identifies cross-segment opportunities, convenes teams around promising initiatives, and supports the transition of long-term work into business-unit execution. The position monitors economic, energy-transition, and demographic trends; identifies adjacent markets and long-term opportunities; and translates insights into pipeline and strategy implications. It stewards long-term cross-business platforms, partners with Finance on an innovation funding model, supports enterprise intellectual-property strategy, and leads a lean innovation Center of Excellence. The role also prepares executive updates and promotes enterprise-first thinking while respecting segment ownership. Ergon is a relationship-driven, family-owned company headquartered in Flowood, Mississippi, with approximately 4,500 employees and operations across multiple sectors. The company describes its culture as collaborative, inclusive, and performance-driven, and emphasizes employee growth, service, leadership, purposeful growth, and respectful relationships.

Requirements

At least 7 years of leadership experience in innovation, strategy, commercialization, or related roles.
Proven success leading cross-business initiatives through influence.
Experience improving innovation or product-development operating models.
Strong strategic foresight, commercial, financial, and analytical skills.
Executive presence and ability to build trust across the enterprise.
Bachelor's degree required.

Nice To Haves

Advanced degree preferred.

Responsibilities

Build and lead an enterprise innovation strategy aligned to organic-growth priorities.
Establish a business-centered innovation narrative tied to measurable growth.
Lead through collaboration and influence rather than centralized control.
Build visibility into the innovation pipeline, including timing, value, and risk.
Develop common stage-gate and prioritization processes.
Define an innovation scorecard and reporting cadence for the Executive Leadership Team and Board.
Identify opportunities to leverage knowledge and assets across segments.
Convene cross-functional teams around high-potential opportunities.
Support the transition of long-term initiatives into business-unit execution.
Monitor economic, energy-transition, and demographic trends.
Identify adjacent markets and long-term opportunities.
Translate insights into innovation-pipeline and strategy implications.
Steward long-term cross-business platform work.
Partner with Finance on an innovation funding model.
Support enterprise intellectual-property strategy.
Lead a lean innovation Center of Excellence and provide program leadership and analytical support.
Prepare updates for the Executive Leadership Team and Board.
Promote enterprise-first thinking while respecting segment ownership and build trust through transparency and disciplined follow-through.