About the Job
🎯 NPD (New Product Development) Operations Strategist
🌍 London, N4
️ 4 days in our office, 1 day working from home
🤝 Reporting to Kelan Patel, Operations
💰 £45-55k per annum + equity
Join Shellworks as an Operations Strategist and help us materialise a better future by eliminating plastic pollution.
About Shellworks
Our vision is a world where the products around you don't damage our environment or our health. At Shellworks we're making that a reality by creating high performance plastic-free materials for everyday products.
Our technology Vivomer makes the impossible possible. It's grown by bacteria using fermentation, creating a material that is stable in use but degrades in every environment. Its breakthrough is being dish-washerable and home compostable at the same time.
We've closed our Series A and are working with some of the world's most recognised brands to replace plastic at volume. We're at an inflection point: scaling from proof-of-concept to mass-market production.
About the Role
This is a high impact role sitting at the heart of Shellworks’ desire to deliver 1 Billion units by 2030. You will drive new initiatives to market standing up operational capabilities and relentlessly executing against them. We are looking for a system builder who can go deep into new problems (e.g. launching our D2C business in a new geography or delivering a new product to market) to drive Shellworks forwards.
You will need deep understanding of what Shellworks does and who we are to constantly bring commercial/ operational & engineering views to new problems and find the right solutions for Shellworks
Key Responsibilities:
● Drive new products to market: Own the delivery of new Shellworks products (e.g. Suri toothbrush/ Before Oral Care bottles/ Ocean Saver cleaning products), balancing financial, commercial and engineering perspectives to deliver success for the customer
● Own the operations for new initiatives: Lead the execution of our newest initiatives. In the short term this is launching direct to consumer products in 2 geographies.
● Leverage analysis for decision making: Build robust analysis of the operational expenditures, understand what decision cost and why, to maintain healthy scaling pathways
● Identify Improvement opportunities: Relentlessly hunt for ways to improve systems and fix gaps
Our Ideal Candidate
● High-agency owner: 3+ years in a high-intensity operational environment (e.g. Start-up, Strategy Consulting) where you’ve owned, end-to-end, the outcomes and process of high-stakes projects.
● Strong first-principles thinker: You break unfamiliar problems down to their fundamentals and reason your way to the best answer, balancing analysis, research and judgement to decide and move
● Operational Excellence: You execute with high precision under conditions of high ambiguity and uncertainty, maintaining momentum against tight timelines without constant supervision
● Bias to execution: You are relentless about turning strategy into shipped reality. Ambiguity and obstacles energise you rather than stall you, and you keep momentum without needing to be managed
● Solution-focused: When something isn’t working, you find another way. You’ve pushed through hard things before and you’ll learn whatever it takes to make this succeed
● STEM Background
What we offer
🌴 28 days holiday + statutory holidays
👶 12 weeks maternity, 6 weeks paternity, both at full pay
💚 Heka wellbeing allowance - gym, therapy, nutrition, fertility support and more
🩺 Virtual GP with same or next day appointments
🚲 Cycle to work scheme - save up to 42% via salary sacrifice
🍕 Daily catered lunch at the office
Hiring Process
📞 Initial Chat
🧠 Technical task
🏭 Onsite
🙌Offer subject to 2 references
Skills Required
- 3+ years of experience in a high-intensity operational environment, such as a startup or strategy consulting
- Experience owning high-stakes projects and outcomes end to end
- Strong first-principles problem-solving and analytical decision-making skills
- Operational excellence and ability to execute independently in ambiguous environments
- Bias toward execution and ability to turn strategy into delivered outcomes
- STEM background
What We Do
Shellworks is a design-led techbio company that creates uncompromising, compostable packaging solutions made from naturally-derived materials, offering a sustainable alternative to conventional plastics.
