Sr Manager, Agricultural Operations

McCormick & Company

About The Position

This is a new role at McCormick that will be responsible for leading agricultural operations of McCormick’s Frank’s Red Hot Sauce and will have one direct report to support on these activities. Primary activities the role will oversee include partnering with procurement and plant operations to plan and forecast each year’s crop plan, leading direct grower contracting in accordance with the plan and budget; and over-seeing all aspects of the cultivation and harvesting. This role will also play a critical role in commercial seed development activities. The Senior Manager will play a strategic role in developing a long-term yield improvement strategy and implementation of that strategy to include: close coordination with seed breeder(s), R&D and University Research groups, and the Sustainability & Agriculture, R&D, Product Development, and Quality teams at McCormick to improve varietals and commercial scale of seed for yield optimization and integration of McCormick’s sustainability targets into the supply chain. This will also include providing strategic recommendations of sourcing regions, farms, and longer-term transformational efforts that will create competitive advantage for McCormick. Throughout the season, the other primary focus of the role will be to maintain and develop grower relationships. The Senior Manager will be responsible for all aspects of grower contracting and monitoring the crop to ensure the crop hits each years’ planned forecast. This includes leading on scouting, grower pricing recommendations, contract structuring, incentives, and providing growers with feedback and recommendations, ensuring compliance to all regulations and Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), and reporting on grower pre-plant, plant, cultivation management, and harvest activities. The Agricultural Operations Senior Manager will lead the harvest readiness and planning in coordination with the plant and logistics team. This will include collaborating to ensure adequate and timely dispatch of trailers to growers to pick the crop and coordinate grower deliveries to the plant to ensure the receipt of fresh product at the processing plant and optimize operational efficiencies and cost.

Requirements

Bachelor's Degree Agriculture or Agriculture Business or Ag Tech.
10-15 years experience in contracting growers and close monitoring of cultivation and harvest activities and influencing growers to improve practices
Fluency in Spanish and English is a MUST
Deep knowledge of chile pepper cultivation for fresh harvest
Knowledge, relationships, and experience in the U.S. southwest and Mexico growing regions
Extremely strong self-initiative, and sense of ownership and urgency to deliver targets in budget
Strong personal network & industry reputation and willingness to leverage this to maintain and develop new grower relationships, negotiate the best grower contract pricing for both parties, obtain the best ground, and build McCormick as the processor of choice in the region
Innovation and ability to think outside the box. The ideal candidate will have a deep sense of respect for traditional farming, but also know how to lead growers to new ways of thinking and break down barriers to encourage new more sustainable farming practices and lead R&D activities to support these efforts.
Ability to effectively communicate barriers and risks to the corporate team and recommend solutions to mitigate and resolve issues
Vision and strong people management skills: ability to help integrate new agricultural capabilities into the McCormick organization thru knowledge, expertise, and vision
Demonstrated effective execution skills with little to no oversight and guidance needed
Good knowledge of Microsoft Office- ability to work effectively in MS Excel to build and manage crop forecasts and conduct analysis on crop yields and ability to prepare PowerPoint presentations for management-level audiences
Strong knowledge of and experience implementing agricultural certification schemes including FSA/SAI, Global GAAP
Substantial experience in the implementation of regenerative agriculture practices