Associate Director S&OP Excellence and Planning Analytics

Earlier this year, Unilever announced an agreement to combine its Foods business with McCormick & Company, creating a scaled global flavour powerhouse. The proposed combination would bring together iconic Foods brands, including Hellmann’s and Knorr, with McCormick’s portfolio to create a global leader across spices, seasonings, condiments and complementary food categories, supported by strong retail and foodservice platforms. McCormick brings more than 135 years of heritage, a presence in 150+ countries and territories, and a portfolio of trusted brands. The transaction remains subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions, with completion estimated for mid-2027. 

JOB PURPOSE 

This role exists to strengthen how the North America Foods business plans, decides, and delivers across demand, supply, inventory, service, cost, and business waste. As Associate Director, S&OP Excellence and Planning Analytics, you will lead the planning excellence and analytics agenda that connects business ambition with practical, reliable operating plans. You will help build a more resilient, data-driven, and collaborative supply chain that enables trusted Foods brands to serve customers and consumers with confidence.  This is inclusive of planning technology, analytics, and process. 

You will be part of a team that believes planning is more than a process. It is a critical way of bringing people together, making better decisions, and creating the conditions for sustainable growth. 

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES 

In this role, you will lead the development and continuous improvement of integrated planning and sales and operations planning practices across North America Foods (Retail and Foods Solutions; US and Canada). You will partner closely with Demand Planning, Supply Planning, Material Planning, Manufacturing, Finance, Customer Development, Marketing, and senior Supply Chain leaders to ensure the business has clear plans, strong governance, reporting/tools, and actionable insights to support growth, service, efficiency, and transformation. 

• Lead a team of WL1s/2s to drive the sales and operations planning excellence agenda.  Ensure robust process and technology are in place to ensure demand, supply, inventory, service, cost, and financial assumptions are connected through clear business rhythms and decision-making forums. 

• Partner with integrated planning teams to identify risks, opportunities, and gaps within planning technology/process and drive improvement plans.  Identify / build business cases or drive cross functional process improvement.   

• Strengthen integrated planning capability by improving processes, tools, routines, governance, and ways of working across the North America Foods planning community. 

• Lead planning performance management, including the maintenance and creation and use of clear measures, scorecards, dashboards, reports, and insights that help teams make faster and better decisions.  This can include modifying existing dashboards due to new business insights 

• Drive continuous improvement, simplification, and standardization across planning processes to improve reliability, reduce complexity, and support scalable ways of working. 

• Act as the primary point of contact for Planning TSAs. 

• Support the transition to the future Foods organization by helping design, build, and embed planning capabilities that enable business continuity from day one and maturity over time. 

• Build trusted relationships across functions and levels, creating a collaborative planning culture where teams are aligned, accountable, and focused on shared outcomes. 

WHAT THE FIRST YEAR LOOKS LIKE 

During the first year, you will play a visible role in building planning excellence for the future North America Foods organization. You will learn the current planning landscape, connect with key partners across the business, and help establish the routines, measures, and decision-making forums needed to support business continuity and performance. 

In your first few months, you will focus on understanding the end-to-end planning processes, key business priorities, current pain points, and transition requirements. You will build relationships with the planning community, data/tech teams, and cross-functional partners, assess existing tools and processes, and identify where stronger governance or simplification is needed. 

As the year progresses, you will lead improvements to planning routines, performance reporting, and sales and operations planning governance. You will help teams align on clear roles, timelines, inputs, decisions, and escalation paths, while supporting capability-building across the planning organization. 

By the end of the first year, you will have helped create a stronger integrated planning foundation for North America Foods, with clearer decision-making, improved planning visibility, stronger cross-functional alignment, and practical tools that support service, inventory, cost, waste reduction, and growth. 

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS 

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Operations, Business, Engineering, Finance, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience. 

• Significant experience 10y+ in integrated planning, demand planning, supply planning, business planning, supply chain transformation, or related end-to-end supply chain roles. 

• Strong understanding of sales and operations planning, forecasting, inventory management, capacity planning, supply planning, service management, and business waste reduction. 

• Experience leading cross-functional planning decisions and balancing service, inventory, cost, responsiveness, and growth priorities. 

• Strong analytical, problem-solving, communication, and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to turn complex information into clear business recommendations. 

• Experience influencing senior stakeholders and leading change in a complex, fast-moving environment. 

• Demonstrated ability to build capability, improve processes, and create practical ways of working that teams can adopt and sustain. 

• Strong understanding of planning tools and technology including back end master data. 

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS 

• Experience in consumer goods, food and beverage, manufacturing, retail, or another complex supply chain environment. 

• Experience leading sales and operations planning improvements, integrated planning transformation, or planning excellence programs across multiple teams or markets. 

• Experience with advanced planning systems, enterprise resource planning systems, business intelligence tools, or planning analytics platforms. 

• Experience supporting organization transition, business separation, integration, or large-scale transformation activities. 

• Advanced degree or professional certification in supply chain, operations, planning, project management, or continuous improvement. 

We welcome applicants from all walks of life and are committed to creating an environment where everyone can thrive/succeed. All applicants will receive fair and respectful consideration, and we actively support the growth and development of every employee.  

We are committed to making reasonable adjustments to provide a positive, barrier-free recruitment journey. Should you require additional information or reasonable adjustments to allow you to present your best self during this process, please contact your Talent Partner. 

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At Unilever, inclusion is at the heart of everything we do. We welcome applicants from all walks of life and are committed to creating an environment where everyone can thrive/succeed. All applicants will receive fair and respectful consideration, and we actively support the growth and development of every employee.
Unilever is an Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Persons with Disabilities.
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