Senior Scientist- UFS Cooking Aids

Unilever•Englewood Cliffs, NJ

2d•Onsite

About The Position

As a member of UFS R&D Cooking Aids team you will be working to develop relevant products under Knorr Brand for menus to local guests, whether that is meeting the need for healthy, delicious, guilt-free dining experiences, localizing a global offering, or bringing the world’s most exciting cuisines to our North America market. Partnership with Marketing, Culinary, Quality, and Supply Chain teams supporting business objectives. Lead technical development (recipe development, specifications, risk management) for North America Cooking Aids products. Support R&D initiatives of quality, nutrition, cost savings, complexity reduction and sustainability by design. Works as a leader and member of a cross functional project team to deliver projects on time and in full.

Requirements

Minimum Bachelor of Science Degree in Food Science or equivalent degree.
Relevant Experience: 5-7 years of experience in the food industry, preferably in product development, processing, and/or project management.
Experience with SAP, specification creation and approval process, demonstrated knowledge/experience in emulsion esp. dressings technology, and good understanding of Supply Chain.
Food Service business preferred.
10-20% travel required.

Responsibilities

Lead and coordinate the R&D activities to deliver the brand’s program, ranging from innovation, renovation, quality and nutrition improvement and cost savings initiatives.
Lead the technical discussions in cross functional meetings and represent the R&D view for the project team to technical and non-technical audiences.
Conduct technical risk assessments and provide recommendations on risk mitigation plans.
Demonstrate flexibility to manage multiple priorities by adapting to daily challenges and priority changes within business environment.
Define the technical project brief and targets against which products can be designed (performance and attributes), developed and measured.
Translate the brand philosophy, culinary and operator insights into superior new products.
Demonstrate strong formulation expertise in Cooking Aids to lead new product design and renovations with speed.
Design and execute test protocols for the various technical aspects of projects as required (e.g., prototype development and scale-up, shelf-life testing, analytical testing, performance testing, etc.).
Lead the process of specification/label creation in SAP PLM from initial request through approved status including lower order specifications/new ingredient specifications and artwork brief generation.
Organize and participate in trials, providing onsite monitoring and technical assistance, while providing formulation adjustment recommendations as needed.
Analyze and interpret data with guidance on final conclusions incl the ability to prepare comprehensive trial/lab reports and presentations, including recommendations and next steps.
Support cost savings (5S) initiatives and supply chain efficiency projects to support quality, cost savings, and complexity reduction initiatives.
Assess feasibility of new ideas and troubleshoot activities where formulation knowledge is essential.
Lead/support technical investigations using root-cause analysis and problem-solving techniques as required for existing and new products.
Provide product expertise and insights into innovation and activation strategies.
Be a product ambassador internally and externally, demonstrate awareness of operator insights and needs/behavior.
Develop and maintain strong working relationships and communicate effectively across R&D and non-R&D functions (with key business and strategic vendor partners) to support business initiatives.