Agriculture & Sustainable Sourcing Manager UK and Ireland

Agriculture & Sustainable Sourcing Manager UK and Ireland

• Full-time

McDonald’s has run its business in the UK since 1974 and celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. The business currently operates over 1,450 restaurants across the UK and Ireland, serving almost four million customers each day. McDonald’s is one of the UK’s largest private sector employers, employing over 177,000 people.

McDonald’s UK & Ireland has a proven track record of investing in the development of its employees and offering flexibility as part of its dedication to being a modern and progressive company. Every year, it invests over £40 million in developing people, giving every one of its employees the opportunity to take part in structured training.

McDonald’s buys ingredients from over 23,000 British and Irish farmers and spends over £1.1 billion annually on its food and packaging requirements. McDonald’s is committed to supporting British and Irish farmers to ensure it can continue to source many of its ingredients from the UK and Ireland.

We are dedicated to using our scale for good: good for people, our industry and the planet. From bold recycling initiatives and sustainable sourcing efforts to our partnership with Ronald McDonald House Charities, we see every day as a chance to have a genuine impact on our customers, our people and our partners.

Hybrid Working
This role is based in our East Finchley office working 3 days in the office and 2 days remotely.

The Opportunity

Lead the McDonald’s UK & Ireland’s Agriculture strategy and continuously develop our approach and progress on animal health and welfare, environmental improvements and enhancing skills and knowledge for young farmers.

• Manage and deliver Global and Market priorities and public commitments, including executing initiatives relevant to the Plan for Change.
• Engage with Departments across the wider business and supplier base to deliver Farm Forward objectives and provide technical direction to meet sustainable sourcing requirements.
• Work with the Strategic Sourcing team to identify opportunities to create shared value across agricultural supply chains.
• Represent McDonald’s and its sustainable sourcing interests both internally and externally with farmers and senior stakeholders across the food and farming industry, Government, NGO and customer base.
• Actively and positively influence McDonald’s brand trust messaging through innovation within the supply chain.
• Support the Agriculture Coordinator (Supplier Secondee) to develop, budget and implement the Progressive Young Farmers Programme.

What will my accountabilities be?

• Lead the delivery of Plan for Change relevant to our agriculture strategy and global priorities.
• Strategically manage and continuously develop relevant Plan for Change goals, including Scope 3 FLAG emissions, regenerative agriculture, and young talent, ensuring delivery is in line with budget.
• Sustainable sourcing lead for priority categories including dairy and beef, providing technical support and embedding sustainability into category strategies to identify future moves and brand trust messaging to deliver measurable competitive advantage.
• Manage research and innovation projects with key partners including suppliers and external consultants, translate and implement learnings and measure results.
• Provide ad hoc technical agriculture support to the UK and Ireland Supply Chain Department and wider business ensuring the agriculture team plays a role in cross departmental initiatives.

Communications

• Provide support and guidance to Communications, Marketing and Public Affairs on agricultural matters and technical content for external facing material e.g. website, marketing, media and press releases.
• Represent and lead the UK and Ireland Agriculture team by building relationships with suppliers, franchisees, internal and external stakeholders to develop opportunities to positively raise the profile of Plan for Change and our sustainable sourcing commitments.
• Develop, evaluate and effectively deliver sponsorship opportunities and provide support for securing budget for partnerships.

Quality and Farm Assurance Standards

• Ensure standards in the UK and Ireland supply chain align with Global Quality and Sustainability principles and seek to find ways to continuously improve standards to maintain a leadership position.
• Partner with Quality Assurance team, suppliers and external stakeholders including Farm Assurance schemes to drive continuous improvement to meet customer's expectations.
• Ensure McDonald’s high-quality standards and auditing processes are adhered to at the front end of the supply chain from farm to abattoir.
• Represent McDonald's at relevant industry events such as agriculture shows, conferences and supply chain visits and develop opportunities for speaking opportunities for both the Agriculture team and senior colleagues.

What Team will I be a part of?

• Adopt a strong collaborative approach to developing and executing the strategic aims of the Agriculture and Sustainability team, UK&I Supply Chain Department and Global Supply Chain and Impact teams.
• Build effective relationships and work closely with Supply Chain colleagues in Strategic Sourcing, Logistics, Quality Assurance and Nutrition and Digital, as well as other teams within the business such as Marketing, Impact, Finance, Legal and Public Affairs.
• Develop excellent communication links with suppliers and to drive forward progressive sustainable sourcing moves and gain reputational integrity.
• Act as the key point of contact for industry stakeholders e.g. Farming Unions, Assurance Schemes, Levy Bodies, Government Departments, NGOs, Universities, Food and Farming media and proactively build networks externally to drive the Farm Forward agenda.

Who are my customers?

• This role will be a member of several product category teams within supply chain comprising a commercial lead and a QA lead.
• Internally: Impact team, Brand Trust team, Marketing team, Senior management.
• Externally: suppliers, agencies, partners and industry bodies.

What background do I need to have?

• Relevant Agriculture or Agri-food degree or equivalent.
• Strong knowledge of sustainability principles.
• Significant experience within a related agriculture or Agri-food industry with a track record of delivery.
• Proven ability to lead, influence and motivate colleagues and suppliers to high performance.
• Budgeting competence and commercial understanding.
• Excellent verbal, written and presentation communication skills.
• Computer Literate- proficient with Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint.