Senior Director NA Brand R&D Lead

About the role

As a Senior Director NA Brand R&D Lead, you’ll bring your skill, your curiosity and your drive to make health simpler, smarter and more human. Lead initiatives that advance our brands and strengthen our reputation worldwide. Mentor and uplift emerging talent while pushing your own growth and influence. Put purpose into practice — embedding sustainability, access and social impact into every decision. Model the challenger mindset: question complexity, act with integrity and make things radically simple. Help shape a culture that’s ambitious, collaborative and serious about recognition and belonging.

Responsibilities

• Be an innovative & creative R&D leader that inspires marketing & commercial with ideas that can be executed.
• Define R&D strategy for our brands. Specifically, lead the R&D innovation pipeline for key growth brands, delivering new products and innovations that meet growth and sales objectives while ensuring consistent execution across the portfolio.
• Drive a culture of acceleration & simplification through effective decision making and risk taking.
• Drive short-, medium-, and long-term product development projects, including new formulations, claims, clinical studies, packaging innovations, and sustainability initiatives, while accelerating decision-making and execution.
• Partner closely with Marketing, Sales, Consumer Science, and Project Management to develop larger, consumer-driven innovation projects and ensure successful, on-time product launches.
• Develop and execute patent strategies and leverage external technology partnerships to create differentiated products and strengthen the long-term innovation pipeline.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Development, Packaging, Finance, Regulatory, and other key stakeholders to build strong business cases, manage project risks, and deliver high-impact innovation.
• Prioritize and lead base business protection projects to maintain product quality, compliance, and supply continuity while balancing business risk.
• Inspire and lead cross-functional teams by fostering innovation, encouraging bold decision-making, and driving accountability to achieve business and R&D objectives.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in a scientific discipline required; Master's or Ph.D. preferred.
• 10+ years of R&D experience leading innovation pipelines and delivering successful product development for consumer health brands.
• Proven experience developing OTC and NDA products, supporting FDA submissions, and managing multiple brands across various regulatory pathways while driving innovation and business growth.
• Strong ability to translate consumer insights into brand strategies, communicate complex science to diverse stakeholders, and influence business decisions through effective storytelling.
• Demonstrated leadership in building and coaching cross-functional technical teams, allocating resources, managing budgets, identifying risks, and driving innovation projects from concept through commercial launch.
• Experience establishing external partnerships with suppliers, research organizations, and key opinion leaders while staying ahead of industry trends to identify new technologies, ingredients, formulations, claims, and sustainable product opportunities.
• Proven ability to lead a diverse innovation portfolio, including business development opportunities, new product development, clinical programs, novel