Innovation Director, Agility Team at Pernod Ricard in New York, NY

Roles and responsibilities:

Help develop and bring to life PRNA Innovation HUB vision to deliver leading edge innovation capabilities

• Working with Sr. Leadership and a cross-functional team, create a consumer-centric Innovation HUB to deliver incremental sustainable growth across the portfolio.
• Help resource, staff and train a top-notch team of innovation marketing experts to accelerate new product development with strong project management skills/output to drive accountability throughout the system
• Oversee and manage the innovation project pipeline, facilitate innovation progression across a number of new product initiatives simultaneously, influencing key cross functional partners.
• Identify and enhance the detailed ways of working with Local & Global Brand Companies and Market.
• Ensure that methodologies / approaches / framework developed are value add and facilitate local and global market needs.

Drive consumer centricity across the business:

• Incorporate a holistic approach to include the consumer, sales, Retailer and Distributor feedback to identify and enhance innovation efforts
• Leverage analytic, insights, and test, learn & optimize (TLO) methodologies to deliver relevant market innovation.
• Incorporate a holistic approach to include the consumer, sales, Retailer and Distributor feedback to identify and enhance innovation efforts
• Balance rigor, data and TLO for speed to market.
• Embed consumer-centricity from ideation to execution
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Create and manage Project Plans & KPIs according to the business needs/strategy of North America:

• Lead the team to help build and bring to market innovation opportunities across the North America portfolio
• Work the innovation pipeline to move projects through the system, deliver on P&L responsibilities while balancing the critical aspects of the innovation that aren’t negotiable.
• Develop project plan, including defining the problem/opportunity, scope, objectives, deliverables, risks, strategies, timeline, budget, resources required, project sponsor / team
• Facilitate and coordinate project team by maintaining/updating the project plan, assigning tasks and responsibilities, along with defining sequencing and dependencies
• Lead and engage stakeholders, motivating the project team, chairing meetings, driving the agenda, participating in decision making, gaining approvals, assigning responsibilities / directing people, pushing people, escalating, and resolving conflict
• Track and manage project timelines and provide status reports to stakeholders and management.
• Communicate to key stakeholders, including brand owners, brand teams, Senior Management, and other cross-functional team members by producing and circulating minutes and conveying project status to key stakeholders

Provide Game-changing project management support to the Hub, by flexing to support and sprint on specific projects

• Lead a team to help support innovation project sprints – from Design, TLOs (test, learn, optimize efforts in market), to development (working with R+D or operations locally or innovation teams at BrandCos)
• Oversee team of Accelerators to support projects throughout the system – be willing to dive into projects wherever support is needed
• Project manage critical PRUSA innovation projects, with pace, through the stage-gate process and ensure compliance from Brand Teams. Lead these projects through the Innovation Leadership Team (ILT) Governance approval process
• Manage Agency partners, cross-functional teams to deliver with excellence, on-time, on-budget

Additionally, provide End-to-End Project Management Oversight

• On key assigned projects – lead these projects from ideation to commercialization, with support from Senior Managers/Directors on the team

Relentlessly drive for action and establish best practices, by collaborating with local and Global Brand Companies, CORBY, NBV, key cross functional partners and Regional Innovation Hubs

• Strong bias for pace and Action – ensure projects are on-time and on-budget
• Actively manage stakeholders – collaborating with wide array of partners, but also driving alignment according to critical path/milestones

Creatively problem solve for challenges along critical path that impact timing or budget

• Understand critical path impacts and solve for challenges along the way – while taking into account budget, timing or consumer/proposition ramifications
• Recognize options to creatively solve for problems and challenges that arise; collaborate with stakeholders to align on tradeoffs
• Manage overall project costs, timelines and workflows. Identify project scope creep to help accelerate speed to market

Coordinate and support local brands and Affiliate Innovation:

• Coordinate and align on the innovation opportunity and pipeline across Canada (CORBY) and the US.
• Support innovation stage gate process

Wider contribution at Regional level: Play an active and strongly engaged role in raising the standard and profile for Marketing across the North America region. Be an active contributor towards the overall Marketing Transformation of Pernod Ricard.

Scope of role:

Direct Reports: Responsible for development and management for team of 4-5 Innovation Marketing Accelerators/Project Coordintaors supporting the new product project management life-cycle working with Hub team members, Insights and local brand teams.

Indirect Reports: Responsible for influencing and coordinating support for innovation development working with Brand Companies, Finance, Legal, R&D, Operations, and Sales and the rest of the innovation Hub.

Key external contacts: Research suppliers, creative agencies, consultants, industry experts, External Collaborators

Key internal contacts: PRNA Marketing Teams, Management Entities in PRNA, HQ, Local and Global Brand Companies, CI COEs and CI planners across Brand & Market Company community.

Budget responsibility: P&L Responsibilities

Geographical scope:

• Local (proportion in %: 80)
• international (proportion in %: 20

Participation in committees, etc.:

Innovation Leadership team (GBD + 3 Regional Hub Directors)

Travel (as % work time):

• Within US: 10-20%
• Post Covid: 20-30% travel including international to Brand Companies and Paris

Qualifications:

Master’s degree preferred

Proven Innovation Experience:

• A minimum of 10+ years relevant experience, such as leading innovation teams in the Spirits industry in North America within a large established organization; other relevant experience such as BelAlc Brand Management, within an innovation agency, within a design team, Project Management experience or technical spirits experience in R+D a plus.
• Demonstrated ability to oversee, manage and deliver innovation projects to market across all phases of the innovation stage gate process (ideation to launch)
• Ability to work through adversity, with examples of management influence.
• Experience collaborating to move projects forward in a complex, matrix organizational structure
• Financial experience to work the P&L and manage costs while staying true to the “must have” innovation deliverables.
• Management experience staffing and running innovation teams
• Proven ability to influence and drive action working with cross-functional teams (internal and external to Pernod Ricard)
• US or Global experience in spirits or RTDs/beer a plus.
• PMO experience using scrum or agile methodologies with examples of how project management has influenced speed to market and quality New Product launches, a plus.
• Languages: English (must have excellent/fluent business proficiency in written and verbal communication); Spanish or French a plus
• Project Management Skills: Strong project management skills – ability to drive agile project management, understand critical path and manage to deadlines in a complex environment.
• Technical skills: Powerpoint, Excel, Word, MS Teams; project Management tools