Head of Category Development

In Australia, the J.R. Simplot Company's core operations are food manufacturing and agriculture, encompassing potato, vegetable, seafood and sauce operations. We supply a wide range of frozen, shelf-stable and chilled products to major retail and foodservice customers in Australia and New Zealand. The Simplot Global Food business includes 17 food manufacturing and processing sites, serving retail and foodservice customers in 37 countries, with 8,000 people across North America, Latin America and Asia Pacific. Globally, the J.R. Simplot Company employs 15,000 people, driving innovation and excellence across diverse industries.

Within the Australian market, we are a leading provider of quality, nourishing and sustainable food, focussed on creating meals that maximises value from the best Australian-grown produce and global seafood. Our iconic brands have been an integral part of Aussie life for generations, and include Leggo's, Birds Eye, Edgell, John West and Chiko.

At Simplot, we are fuelled by our purpose: We Contribute to Feeding Our World. We imagine a better future and set goals to reach it. We are committed to working as one Simplot and are guided by our shared values:

• Respect for Resources
• Spirit of Innovation
• Passion for People

We embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion. We care about creating an environment that promotes safety and wellbeing and where our people feel supported, respected and empowered. We do not tolerate any form of discrimination and are committed to providing equal opportunities for all our team members.

Simplot is passionate about cultivating a future where good ideas and inspiring possibilities have the chance to grow. We want our team members to build exciting and fulfilling careers with us and offer professional and personal growth opportunities.

• Flexible working arrangements and a variety of engaging Health and Wellbeing programs
• Diverse Leadership Development Programs and Professional Development Support
• Employee Reward and Recognition Program
• Sensory Club Program – Enjoy and taste our new product launches and access to our Culinary cooking sessions

Simplot values the creativity and meaningful relationships that grow through face-to-face connection while also recognising the importance of flexibility for our team members. Our hybrid work environment includes four days in the office, with Wednesdays as our dedicated ‘Connect Day' bringing everyone together to strengthen our successful culture of innovation and collaboration.

In this exciting newly created contract role, as our Head of Category Development you will provide strategic direction and overall management across our categories with the purpose to provide leadership and a best practice approach for the Category Development function, driving growth across our portfolio of categories. The role will ensure there is a two-way feed into our business category strategies, growing overall consumption and help shape our participation in these categories in the future to capitalise on category trends. In this role you will review a consistent approach to a data-led 3-year shopper growth strategy, underpinned by category/shopper insights, analytics and recommendations.

With responsibility for the total portfolio, this role will take the lead in aggregating total portfolio category strategies across the Grocery shopper and Food Services customer, and then independently leading our key strategic customers on this agenda, working with key stakeholders and supporting the progress of our multi-channel Enterprise strategy.

This is an exciting 6-month contract role, with the possibility of further extension including permanency, dependant on business needs.

• Lead the strategy and execution across Australia and NZ and provide key thought leadership into new regions including Asia.
• Play an instrumental role in leading the voice of category development through our Global Food business in terms of strategy, processes and execution.
• Drive robust leadership across the category development team compromising of four Senior Category Managers and an Assistant Category Manager.
• Lead the aggregation of our total portfolio category strategies which are anchored in the shopper and independently leads our key strategic customers in Retail and Food Service.
• Seamlessly aggregate all individual category insights into a total Channel/Shopper market insight perspective which guides the channel position from a total portfolio perspective.
• Actively explore untapped opportunities in the application of category thinking and better market data utilisation in the Food Service channel.
• Ongoing consistent capability build of the total Category Development team, leveraging best practice.
• Liaise with cross functional teams and agitate the shorter-term business challenges and opportunities, ensuring that decisions are congruent with long term category vision, strategies and aspirations.
• Support the Category Development Managers to provide category/shopper insights, analytics and recommendations to relevant teams to enable the development of the 0–3-year Commercial Operations Plan.
• Leadership of strong relationships with retailer partners by providing a total category approach to retailer recommendations, with valued insights, analytics and strategies.
• Work with Heads of Category and Marketing Manager for both Freezer and Pantry, as well as the IBP community.
• Lead a consolidated, total portfolio, prioritised approach to driving our agencies to better leverage their broader insights in informing our strategies, and improving utilisation, leverage, and ROI across the total business.

You are a versatile and dynamic commercial leader with a significant track record of delivering exceptional ROI. You have well versed knowledge and experience of developing strategic plans in food (or related FMCG), with experience in managing change that impacts the team and business. You will have well rounded commercial business acumen combined with the ability to understand and analyse detailed financial information and reports. Along with this you will display strong business judgment and decision-making skills with the ability to identify, prioritise, and articulate highest impact initiatives. Working within a dynamic matrix environment you will be able to successfully engage and influence multiple stakeholders and present and influence at a senior ELT level. In this role you will also demonstrate the ability to develop cross functional relationships and teams.

If this sounds like you, then please apply online now! Applications close on Friday 21st March 2025.

#LI-KC1

#LI-Hybrid

Job Requisition ID:21688

Travel Required:Less than 10%

Location(s):GF Chifley Business Park Office - Melbourne

Country:Australia

Simplot is an equal opportunity employer and encourage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to apply. If you feel you would be a great addition to our team please apply online today, we would love to hear from you.