Senior Quality & Food Safety Area Specialist

What you’ll do 

The Quality Systems Sr Specialist provides functional leadership to develop, implement, maintain and improve Quality and Food Safety Management programs for the site and across the network to ensure that end products are safe for human consumption and meet customer, consumer and regulatory requirements to achieve business objectives. The Quality Systems Sr Specialist provides leadership to improve Q&FS Management System

• Act as back up to the Quality and Food Safety Manager, provides leadership and technical expertise during incident investigation and risk analysis as well as provides recommendations for appropriate resolution
• Lead the implementation of Global Quality and Food Safety Standards to ensure compliance with applicable statutory and regulatory food safety requirements
• Lead the site quality and food safety management review process to identify improvement opportunities for quality and food safety management systems
• Development and roll out of food safety training to the site and support functions (HACCP, Basic Food Safety)
• Provide governance to the Microbiological verification, environmental program, Mycotoxin, Allergens, Cleaning and Sanitation programs
• Provide governance to HACCP and Food Safety Plan within the site, provide input to the Value stream Food safety. Food Safety Team Leader at the site. Manage validation of CCP/OPRP preventive controls programs within the site
• Responsible for providing site input to the Material Risk Assessments (MRA’s) 
• Lead root cause analysis investigation of food safety incidents and effective implementation of corrective/preventive actions
• Lead Q&FS input for engineering related projects within the site and lead Commissioning, Validation and start up  Handover process for Q&FS.
• Lead Q&FS continuous improvement projects for the site  to improve the brand experience.
• Lead in combination with Q&FS Manager product related incident management process and provide recommendation on product disposition
• Lead Communities of practice to drive standardization, and creation of best practices
• Coach and develop associates in Q&FS team within the site or across the network.

How you’ll do it 

• Lead gap assessment to the Mars Global standards and regulatory requirements, lead the Food Defense Plan and continuous improvement of quality systems and to ensure compliance
• Partners with supply Make and Engineering, R&D and other key stakeholders to implement changes, new process or new products in a safe manner and implement product quality conformance system 
• Responsible for providing outlining Q&FS requirements on engineering projects, developing all the Q&FS documents, SOP’s, delivering training for associates as required for the start of new lines or processes at the site and creating QFS best practices
• Lead continuous improvement of QFS system and product quality and conformance to specification through analysis of data and evaluation of trends through use of statistical analysis for a given brand for region
• Builds knowledge of the company, processes and customers. Understands key business drivers and uses this understanding to accomplish own work.
• Builds a network of cross functional partners to accomplish business objectives
• Provides guidance and direction to others

You have 

Minimum Qualifications

• BS degree in Chemistry, Food Science, Food Safety, Engineering or related technical field
• 3 years of food manufacturing experience in a responsible position related to food safety or Quality and food safety management system and or a combination of education and 5+ years demonstrated success in relevant field

Preferred Qualifications

• Advanced degree in Chemistry, Food Science, Food Safety, Engineering or related technical field
• 2 years of food plant experience in a responsible position related to food safety or Quality and food safety management system 
• Demonstrated leadership capabilities in leading a team

What you’ll bring to KIND  

• Demonstrated success with Food safety risk, identification and management, HACCP and prerequisite controls
• Proven application of quality tools, food science, and statistics
• Demonstrated capability to manage multiple priorities 
• Proven leadership within a team and demonstrated ability to lead change 
• Exhibited understanding of GMP, GLP, food allergens, pest control, sanitation, and food safety regulations
• Expert knowledge of Food Safety Standards, procedures and legislation
• Ability to work effectively in cross functional teams
• Strong written and verbal communication skills. Strong presentation Skills
• Demonstrated success with Food safety risk, identification and management, HACCP and prerequisite controls
• Experienced auditor in GFSI Quality Systems such as SQF, BRC, FSSC22000 or ISO9000 preferable.
• Ability to travel 10% of the time

Certain states and localities require employers to post a reasonable estimate of salary range. A reasonable estimate of the current base salary range for this position is $85,000 to $100,000. Actual salary will be based on a variety of factors, including location, experience, skill set, performance, licensure and certification, and business needs. The range for this position in other geographic locations may differ. KIND compensation includes target bonuses.