Sr. Project Lead, Culinary Commercialization

The Culinary & Commercialization team is responsible for cultivating remarkable food that drives Customer trust and brand value and can be executed with excellence by Team Members. This includes the development of craveable new menu items, the improvement of existing menu items to increase relevance and protect quality and developing menu process simplifications to improve the Team Member experience.

The Sr. Project Lead of Culinary Commercialization will work to equip Operators and Team Members with processes and tools to enable menu growth, consistently meet Customer expectations, and execute with excellence. This individual will help conduct research and create solutions for the Commercialization advanced development pipeline and pantry. In doing so, this role is responsible for the R&D of menu process solutions, setting feasibility guidelines for menu development, and planning effective training tools for Team Members. This requires building new external partner relationships, leading research to support larger scale simplification systems and processes with data-driven decision making.

This individual will lead projects for menu process simplifications. A critical part of this role is to partner with the cross functional menu project team during the development of new menu items to provide operational expertise so that those items can be integrated successfully into Chick-fil-A's food production system.

This individual will serve as a Menu & Packaging liaison to other departments to ensure product quality and product execution standards are upheld. This role requires spending time in Chick-fil-A restaurants regularly to understand current operations and to evaluate the impact of any proposed test or rollout. It is important that this role be able to collaborate effectively across various teams as well as influence senior leadership and project leaders regarding operational considerations.

Our Flexible Future model offers a healthy mix of working in person and virtually, strengthening key elements of the Chick-fil-A culture by fostering collaboration and community.

Commercialization R&D Pipeline and Pantry Solutions:

• Menu process simplification.
• Understand operational challenges within Chick-fil-A’s portfolio of kitchens.
• Lead the innovation and validation of the ingredients and tools needed to develop new menu items consistently and efficiently.
• Coordinate field tests, research, and data gathering in Chick-fil-A restaurants and analyze results prior to chainwide launch.

Culinary Expertise:

• Responsible for culinary evaluations on commercialization solutions that impact food.
• This includes ensuring items meet our gold standard quality metrics, identifying the specifications needed to meet quality standards, and providing guidance to project leads on third party sensory evaluations.
• Work with autonomy to drive outcomes while managing relationships with suppliers, and internal and external partners.
• Lead complex projects effectively and professionally to ensure stakeholders are informed and supportive, and Restaurant Operator and customer expectations are met.

Production Methods Development:

• Design food production methods that simplify existing Chick-fil-A menu items as well as supporting new menu items.
• Integrate simplification techniques into the food production process to ensure that all future menu items not only meet culinary standards but are operationally feasible.

Cross Functional Support:

• Provide subject matter expertise on complex projects in support of teams across the organization to ensure product quality metrics and operational requirements can be attained.

Menu and Packaging Liaison:

• Responsible for ensuring both the quality and operational objectives are met with partner-led projects that impact food.

Restaurant Operational Expertise:

• Responsible for deep understanding of the food production process and their impact to food quality and team member experience.
• Responsible for spending time engaging in Chick-fil-A Restaurants, learning from Team Members and Operators on operational opportunities.

Executive Communication:

• Present a clear and compelling overview of menu process simplifications, food production methods, and impact to the portfolio of Chick-fil-A Restaurants.
• Exhibit the ability to present solutions and procedures to multiple levels of leadership – Executive Committee, Strategy Teams, Operators, Team Members, etc.

Competence Development:

• Actively explore food trends to stay abreast of changes in the marketplace.
• Exhibit strong knowledge and awareness of historical and competitive marketplace.
• Maintain professional and technical knowledge by attending educational workshops, reviewing professional publications, establishing personal networks, benchmarking state-of-the-art practices, and participating in professional societies.

• 4+ years of relevant experience
• Bachelor’s Degree or the equivalent combination of education, training and experience from which comparable skills can be acquired.
• Degree focused in Culinary Arts, Culinary Management, Food & Beverage Management, Culinology, Food Science, Food Manufacturing, Quality Assurance or similar.
• Mastery of fundamental culinary techniques.
  
• Strong technical understanding of food production.
  
• Successful track record of creating, developing, and executing new menu items in a restaurant environment.
  
• A basic understanding of Lean Six Sigma, Root Cause Analysis, or other process improvement principles.
  
• Experience in designing and execution experiments, process, Sensory, or consumer testing.
  
• Strong executive presence and communication skills presenting to senior leadership.
  
• Collaborate effectively with internal and external international business partners.
  
• Sound relational and feedback gathering skills that enable valuable interactions with restaurant level Team Members, Owner/Operators, and/or project stakeholders in a restaurant business environment.
  
• Commitment to maintain and guard confidential proprietary company information as appropriate.
  
• Proficient at Project Management.
  

• 8+ years of relevant work experience
• Bachelor's degree
• Strong technical understanding of food production in a franchised restaurant environment.
• Certified in Lean Six Sigma or other process improvement certifications.
• Ability to think critically about challenges and opportunities and identify solutions and options.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Suite.