Job DescriptionGlobal Quality and Food Safety Director Specialty Ingredients - Decatur, ILThe Global Quality & Food Safety Director is responsible for establishing and advancing the Business Unit's Food Safety and Quality Management System across operations in North America, South America, and Europe. This role provides strategic leadership for the development, standardization, implementation, and continuous improvement of food safety and quality programs, ensuring consistent application of global standards while maintaining compliance with regional regulatory requirements.
As a key member of the leadership team, the Global Quality & Food Safety Director serves as a change agent, fostering a culture of quality, food safety excellence, accountability, and continuous improvement across the organization. The role partners closely with Operations, Supply Chain, Commercial, Procurement, R&D, and corporate functions to drive operational excellence, mitigate risk, and support business growth.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic Leadership & Governance- Develop and execute the Business Unit's global Food Safety and Quality strategy, aligning initiatives with overall business objectives and growth priorities.
- Establish governance processes that ensure consistent implementation of food safety and quality standards, policies, and best practices across all regions and facilities.
- Lead the harmonization of food safety and quality requirements across manufacturing sites, distribution operations, and supply chains.
- Drive continuous improvement through standardized audit programs, risk management processes, corrective actions, and management review systems.
- Champion digital quality initiatives and system optimization efforts to improve transparency, efficiency, and data-driven decision-making.
Regulatory Compliance & Risk Management- Ensure compliance with applicable global, regional, and local regulatory requirements, including FDA, EFSA, MAPA, Codex Alimentarius, and other relevant food safety regulations and standards.
- Serve as the executive lead for product recalls, food safety incidents, and quality-related crises, ensuring effective communication, risk mitigation, and corrective action implementation.
- Oversee internal, customer, regulatory, and third-party audits, ensuring timely resolution of findings and sustainable corrective actions.
- Lead enterprise risk assessment activities to proactively identify, evaluate, and mitigate food safety and quality risks.
Operational Excellence & Performance- Partner with Operations, Supply Chain, R&D, Quality Technology Centers, and other key stakeholders to ensure product quality, consistency, and compliance across the value chain.
- Establish and monitor global quality and food safety performance metrics and KPIs, providing actionable insights and recommendations to senior leadership.
- Drive continuous improvement initiatives that enhance product quality, operational performance, customer satisfaction, and regulatory compliance.
Food Safety & Quality Culture- Develop and implement a global Food Safety and Quality Culture strategy that strengthens employee engagement, accountability, and ownership.
- Partner with centralized functional teams to establish training and competency programs that build technical expertise and leadership capability.
- Serve as a trusted advisor to executive leadership on food safety culture maturity, organizational effectiveness, and improvement opportunities.
Supplier Quality Management- Lead the development and execution of the global Supplier Quality Management program.
- Establish supplier qualification, approval, monitoring, and performance management processes.
- Partner with Procurement and Supply Chain teams to ensure supplier compliance with food safety, quality, and regulatory requirements.
- Lead supplier risk assessments and mitigation strategies for raw materials, ingredients, packaging materials, and service providers.
- Strengthen supply chain resilience through proactive quality risk management and supplier performance improvement initiatives.
Leadership & Stakeholder Engagement- Lead and develop regional Food Safety and Quality teams across multiple geographies.
- Foster collaboration among manufacturing facilities, laboratories, business units, and corporate functions.
- Build and maintain strong relationships with customers, regulatory authorities, certification bodies, and industry organizations.
- Serve as the organization's senior subject matter expert for food safety and quality.
- Influence and engage executive leadership to advance strategic food safety, quality, and compliance initiatives.
Qualifications:
Education- Bachelor's degree in Food Science, Engineering, Chemistry, Quality Management, Microbiology, or a related technical discipline required.
- Master's degree preferred.
Experience- Minimum of 10 years of progressive leadership experience in Food Safety and Quality within protein, ingredient, agricultural processing, oilseed processing, food manufacturing, or related industries.
- Experience in low-moisture food manufacturing strongly preferred.
- Demonstrated success leading multi-site, multi-regional Food Safety and Quality programs within complex manufacturing environments.
- Enterprise-level Food Safety and Quality leadership experience required.
- Experience leading organizational culture transformation initiatives preferred.
- Proven experience engaging with executive leadership, regulatory agencies, customers, certification bodies, and industry stakeholders.
Knowledge, Skills & Competencies- Extensive knowledge of HACCP, preventive controls, food safety systems, quality management systems, and regulatory compliance requirements.
- Strong understanding of food manufacturing operations, laboratory environments, and quality assurance processes.
- Exceptional leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills.
- Ability to effectively influence and communicate across all levels of the organization, including executive leadership, customers, and regulatory officials.
- Strong strategic thinking, problem-solving, risk management, and change leadership capabilities.
- Demonstrated ability to lead teams and drive results in a global, matrixed organization.
Excited about this role but don't think you meet every requirement listed? We encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this role or another one of our openings.
REF:111571BR
Benefits and Perks Enriching the quality of life for the world begins by taking care of our colleagues. In addition to competitive pay, we support your diverse needs with a comprehensive total rewards package to enhance your well-being, including:
- Physical wellness - medical/Rx, dental, vision and on-site wellness center access or gym reimbursement (as applicable).
- Financial wellness - flexible spending accounts, health savings account, 401(k) with matching contributions and cash balance plan, discounted employee stock purchasing program, life insurance, disability, workers' compensation, legal assistance, identity theft protection.
- Mental and social wellness - Employee Assistance Program (EAP), Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) and Colleague Giving Programs (ADM Cares).
Additional benefits include:
- Paid time off including paid holidays.
- Adoption assistance and paid maternity and parental leave.
- Tuition assistance.
- Company-sponsored training and development resources, such as LinkedIn Learning, language training and mentoring programs.
*Benefits may vary for bargained locations, confirm benefit eligibility with your recruiter.
Base pay offered may vary depending on multiple individualized factors, including market location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. Hourly and salaried non-exempt employees will also be paid overtime pay when working qualifying overtime hours.
If hired, employees will be in an "at-will position" and the Company reserves the right to modify base pay (as well as any other discretionary payment or compensation program) at any time, including for reasons related to individual performance, Company or individual department/team performance, and market factors.
The pay range for this position is expected to be between:
