Your Role
The R&D Manager is a critical technical and people leader responsible for translating innovation briefs and market trends into robust, scalable, and compliant product formulations. This role leads formulation development across the full product lifecycle-ideation through commercialization-while building strong cross functional partnerships, developing team capability, and enabling informed technical decisions that support VS&Co Beauty's path to potential, innovation agenda, and global growth.
The ideal candidate is a strategic, hands on leader with deep formulation expertise, strong systems thinking, and the ability to balance creativity with disciplined execution. This role serves as a trusted technical partner to Product Development, Packaging, Safety, Regulatory, and external suppliers-ensuring products are technically sound, execution ready, and aligned with enterprise priorities.
Your Impact
Formulation Leadership & Product Development
• Lead the development of innovative, high performance formulations aligned with briefs, consumer insights, market trends, and regulatory requirements, in partnership with the PFD team.
• Own formulation strategy and technical decision making from concept through pilot, scale up, and commercialization.
• Anticipate technical, stability, compatibility, and scalability risks early in development and proactively define mitigation strategies to protect timelines and launch readiness.
Lifecycle & Cross Functional Execution
• Manage product deliverables across all phases of development, ensuring clear ownership, disciplined milestones, and effective cross functional handoffs.
• Partner closely with Packaging Development to ensure formula package synergy, lead compatibility troubleshooting, drive root cause analysis, and implement sustainable solutions.
• Strengthen collaboration across R&D, Packaging, Safety, Regulatory, Quality, Supply Chain, and contract fillers to improve ways of working and reduce rework.
Decision Enablement & Technical Insight
• Synthesize formulation data, stability results, and development learnings into concise, actionable insights, options, and recommendations for cross functional and leadership stakeholders.
• Clearly communicate risks, assumptions, trade offs, and mitigation paths to support informed and timely decisions.
• Elevate technical issues appropriately, balancing urgency, business impact, and solution oriented thinking.
Stability, Systems & Process Excellence
• Oversee internal and external stability testing programs; assess results, troubleshoot failures, and ensure formulas are robust and commercially ready.
• Ensure accurate execution of systems workflows with strong documentation discipline, data integrity, and downstream readiness.
• Identify and lead continuous improvement opportunities within R&D workflows, systems, and documentation to improve first pass success, reduce cycle time, and enable scalable execution.
Supplier & External Partnership Leadership
• Lead the sourcing and evaluation of new raw materials, actives, and technologies in collaboration with contract fillers and suppliers.
• Translate supplier capabilities and external technical insights into development strategies that support innovation, performance, and long term scalability.
• Ensure seamless transfer of formulas, specifications, and expectations to external manufacturing partners.
• Track and assess supplier performance, using metrics to drive accountability and continuous improvement.
Safety & Regulatory Partnership
• Partner with the Safety team to define appropriate clinical and performance testing strategies to support product claims.
• Collaborate with Regulatory partners to understand upcoming requirements and ensure development plans proactively align to current and future compliance expectations.
• Embed Product Integrity and regulatory considerations early in development to avoid late stage risk and rework.
People Leadership & Capability Development
• Lead, mentor, and develop a team of technical project managers and lab technicians-assigning work, setting priorities, and building strong technical and problem solving capability.
• Coach beyond task execution by developing ownership mindset, decision quality, and systems thinking within the team.
• Own onboarding, development planning, performance feedback, and recognition to build an engaged, high performing R&D team.
• Foster a culture of accountability, curiosity, continuous improvement, and collaboration aligned with Product Integrity and enterprise priorities.
Click here for benefit details related to this position.
• 10-15 years of experience in formulation development within beauty, personal care, fragrance, or a related regulated industry.
• Minimum of 2 years in a people leadership role.
• Master's degree in Cosmetic Science, Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, or related field preferred.
• Strong technical formulation expertise with hands on experience in stability, compatibility, and scale up.
• Proven ability to lead teams, influence cross functional partners, and translate technical complexity into clear insights.
• Demonstrated problem solving, systems thinking, and continuous improvement mindset.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills; confident engaging with internal and external stakeholders.
• Comfortable operating in a fast paced, innovation driven environment with multiple priorities.
• Willingness to travel to suppliers and external partners as needed.
