Director, Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory- International

International Dairy Queen • Bloomington, MN

6d • $128,841 - $161,052 • Hybrid

About The Position

We have an exciting opportunity available for a Director, Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory supporting our international regions working hybrid out of our corporate office in Bloomington, MN. This position provides international strategic leadership and direction within the Food, Safety, Quality and Regulatory team. While it has a significant number of within-department responsibilities, it also works with cross-functional teams to deliver high quality and safe products to restaurants, ensure regulatory compliance, and lead select corporate responsibility initiatives. This position supports all international regions and markets, which includes China, Asia Pacific, Middle East, Latin America & Caribbean, along with new market entry from a FSQR perspective.

Requirements

• B.S. Degree in food science or closely related field.
• Must have 10 years of experience in quality management and food safety.
• Minimum of three years of experience managing employees required.
• Proven ability to lead remote teams, to manage progress effectively in ambiguous and sometimes unstructured situations.
• Capable of delivering challenging/constructive feedback to suppliers or internal personnel and maintaining steady direction yielding right results quickly.
• Project management - demonstrated ability to develop efficient planning methodologies and effective utilization of resources to achieve high value results.
• Ability to manage and prioritize multiple, complex projects and responsibilities in a fast-changing and deadline-driven environment.
• Ability to influence individuals across diverse functions to gain support and meet established objectives; able to articulate technical information to a variety of audiences.
• Relationship building skills with the ability to create mutually beneficial relationships with both internal and external clients.
• Strategic and creative thinker that can create and execute business-relevant strategies
• Expertise in food manufacturing, processes and packaging.
• Knowledge of food purchasing, distribution and logistics.
• Knowledge of current industry and technical issues associated with food safety, nutrition, public health, environment and animal rights.
• Thorough knowledge of safety, microbiology, and regulatory requirements globally.
• Ability to apply sound technical principles to root cause analyses, problem solving and project management.
• Strong analytical skills.

Nice To Haves

• Conversational Spanish and ability to build relationships with Spanish‑speaking suppliers and partners preferred.

Responsibilities

• Leads and directs strategic development, improvement, implementation, execution, measurement and communication of risk based quality and food safety programs, tools and outcomes that are designed to deliver safe and high-quality food for Dairy Queen business lines.
• Vendor, product (food, packaging, and chemicals), commissary and warehouse qualification, onboarding, compliance, risk assessment and management
• Specification compliance – tools, measurement, reporting, trends, feedback and continuous improvement
• Issue resolution: Proactively and reactively monitor, manage and communicate quality and food safety issues (complaint response, holds, withdrawals, recalls, recovery, crises, guest incidents), including determining root cause analysis
• Identifies trends and applies advanced technical knowledge and skills to solve problems develop corrective actions for on-going supplier quality issues related to product manufacturing and quality control.
• Work with Product Development, Legal and Supply Chain to define process parameters and criteria to ensure supplier process capability is effective and compliant to all laws/regulations required
• Technical problem solving
• Partnership with Product Development during development and test phase
• Develops positive cross functional (within IDQ) and external relationships (suppliers, government, industry associations, industry leaders) that generate strategic direction, business solutions, create trust, and help develop future department strategies that align with the evolving business.
• Identifies situations that warrant communication and promptly and effectively communicates need-to-know FSQR items to internal and external stakeholders
• Develops strategies and team & department goals that align with department mission and business goals
• Provides routine coaching and direction to team members to help ensure department and company goals are prioritized and met
• Identifies and implements strategies to generate team member satisfaction and productivity
• Elevates team or project issues to department and company leadership as appropriate
• Provides input to and helps manage department budget
• Directs team members to or as a contributor, monitors and interprets restaurant regulatory and food safety changes (e.g., Food Code, nutrition, etc.) and communicates to and collaborates with internal stakeholders on solutions.
• May be asked to lead compliance projects.
• Work with internal stakeholders and lead (where assigned) corporate responsibility initiatives.
• May include creation of strategies, implementation, execution, project management and reporting.

Benefits

• Our benefit package supports the well-being of our employees and their families.
• Our comprehensive benefit package includes, medical, dental, 401K match, paid time off (including volunteer time as well as parental leave) and so much more!

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director