Associate Food Safety Quality Manager - Avon, IA

OVERVIEW:

As an Associate Food Safety Quality Manager, you will be responsible for championing food safety and quality across the 2 Operating Units, Meals & Baking, and NAF-Bakery Flour that Avon services. This role reports directly to the Plant Manager and will have four direct reports. This position will work closely with the Operations team to provide quality, regulatory, and sanitation technical expertise to deliver excellence in product quality and food safety.

You will also have the unique opportunity to impact the Innovation, Technology, and Quality function by leveraging your knowledge and skills to provide deep technical expertise, become a leader of global connections, and be recognized as a valued partner for our plant, sourcing, and business teams. The right candidate for this role will leverage strong project management skills, relationship management skills, be results-oriented, and be able to find opportunities for value creation to help the company succeed.

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES

Safety

• Lead Food and Human Safety through Safety 2.0 leadership principles and standards.
• Cultivate a Human Safety Culture that reduces risk to our people and communities by increasing the capability to identify and control critical risk.
• Cultivate a Food Safety Culture that is committed to manufacturing safe food that is compliant with policy and regulatory requirements.
• Lead the Food Safety Team for Avon, driving change through RMP and other food safety initiatives.

People Leadership

Role model Engaging Leader behaviors.

• Demonstrate a strong learning mindset for personal development & growth in expanded areas of subject matter expertise
• Engage internally and externally (NA & globally) with cross-functional partners and Subject Matter Experts and demonstrate quality engineering skills.
• Train, develop content, and coach Quality Associates, Quality Engineers, and plant personnel (Systems Engineers, operators, plant leaders, etc.) as needed
• Build alignment & strategies with cross-functional partners across the plant.
• Leadership of FSQ technicians, FSQ professionals, and mentoring others.

Process Leadership and Ownership

Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory programs leadership.

• Provide FSQ leadership and direction through technical depth in the areas of regulatory compliance, sanitation, food safety risk mitigation, quality improvement, and loss reduction.
• Synthesize plant-wide action plans with Operations, R&D, Engineering, and FSQ teams to ensure product specifications and execution of FSQ policies & standards are appropriate and meet system capability and key consumer requirements.

Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory technical leadership & subject matter expertise.

• Lead plantwide Food Safety and Quality Program management and training.
• Deliver training in the areas of food science, applied statistics, regulatory requirements, sanitation, and quality measurement systems. Review plans for new and changing systems and ensure effective product safety and sanitary design.
• Serve as experts in systems/programs with cross-plant / corporate/global connections.
• Provide leadership and technical support for R&D, HMM, reformulations, and new product start-ups across the site.
• Maintain plant food safety programs (FSRA, HACCP, etc.) and annual GFSI and GMI policy requirements. o
• Responsible for the management of raw material vendors and performance.
• Provide sanitation and pest control leadership (equipment sanitation validation & run length validations, creation of SSOPs, pest control and chemical vendor relationships, and budget).
• Provide technical leadership in the identification and implementation of product and process quality improvement opportunities and resultant productivity gains.
• Provide and lead risk assessment analysis and manage issues with non-conforming products to ensure proper control, minimize losses, and conduct root cause analysis to eliminate future occurrences across the plant.

Know your Operation, Data, and Technology

• Lead digitization initiatives, leveraging advanced technologies such as automation, data analytics, and digitalization to enhance quality processes, improve product performance, and ensure plant-wide compliance with industry standards.
• Using quality engineering principles, collect, analyze, and interpret in-process and analytical data to make quality and food safety evaluations, recommend actions for improvement, and ultimately, plant-wide informed data-driven decisions.
• Showcase expertise across Problem Solving, FSQ systems, Data & Analytics, and coach & mentor QEs and other roles across the plant
• Identify & execute plant-wide HMM, Food Safety, and Quality initiatives

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Food Science, Packaging, Material Science, or related field
• 7+ years of food safety quality experience in a manufacturing setting
• HACCP and PCQI Certified
• Ability to manage cross-platform projects and be comfortable with ambiguity
• Demonstrated mechanical aptitude, ability to apply engineering principles, and ability to troubleshoot.
• Demonstrated results-orientation with strong problem-solving and analytical skills
• Ability to manage multiple tasks and adjust priorities.
• Knowledge of product protection and Quality Engineering principles.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Self-starter who can prioritize workload while meeting commitments
• Strong understanding of product quality, sensory, and food safety.
• Strong understanding of Zero Loss Culture philosophy and tools.
• Demonstrated people leadership with the ability to navigate complex organizations

ADDITIONAL CONSIDERATIONS

• Applicants for this position must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis, and General Mills will not sponsor applicants for this position for work visas.
• International relocations or remote assignments will not be considered for this role.

We exist to make food the world loves. But we do more than that. Our company is a place that prioritizes being a force for good, a place to expand learning, explore new perspectives and reimagine new possibilities, every day. We look for people who want to bring their best - bold thinkers with big hearts who challenge one other and grow together. Because becoming the undisputed leader in food means surrounding ourselves with people who are hungry for what's next.

Salary Range

The salary range for this position is $108900.00 - $163500.00 / Annually. At General Mills we strive for each employee's pay at any point in their career to reflect their experiences performance and skills for their current role. The salary range for this role represents the numerous factors considered in the hiring decisions including, but not limited to, educations, skills, work experience, certifications, etc. As such, pay for the successful candidate(s) could fall anywhere within the stated range. Beyond base salary, General Mills offers a competitive Total Rewards package focusing on your overall well-being. We are proud to offer a foundation of health benefits, retirement and financial wellbeing, time off programs, wellbeing support and perks. Benefits may vary by role, country, region, union status, and other employment status factors. You may also be eligible to participate in an annual incentive program. An incentive award, if any, depends on various factors, including, individual and organizational performance.

Reasonable Accommodation Request

If you need to request an accommodation during the application or hiring process, please fill out our online accommodations request form by following this link: Accommodations Request.