Future Portfolio Innovations Planner at Unilever

Background & Purpose of the Job

• Reporting to the Cluster Category Strategic Planning Manager, the Regional Innovation Planning role is suitable for someone with broad experience within the Africa Cluster SC organization. 
• The role is suitable for a skilled and ambitious Supply Chain professional, with previous expertise in the broader Supply Chain. 
• As the WL1 custodian of the category’s innovation process, the role requires good communication skills, financial acumen and strong category Supply Chain knowledge.

Key Accountabilities
The following shall be the main accountabilities of the role holder:

Innovation Planning:

• Supply Chain lead for Innovation until MRG, working with Marketing and R&D leads in the Innovation trio team & Represents E2E SC (except Procurement) and Capabilities Organization in project network meetings
• Ownership of Supply Chain activities like quality audits, factory trials, technical risk assessments 
• Works with innovation project teams to develop and update networks for projects.
• Ensures Supply Chain input, after consultation with 3P SC, MCO Planning, SU Processing and Logistics teams, is factored into networks until MRG and that SC tasks are executed on time.
• Engages SU Process/ SUIT to verify innovation capability and, where capability does not exist, ensures Capex requirements have been shared by SU Process / SUIT for use in the Business case support process.
• Supports the Capital Expenditure Proposal (CEP) process with Category inputs and ensure alignment to Category strategy; Ensures capex requirements for Innovations are collated with Brand Marketing team, in line with the 12Q plans
• Ensures each project has a completed Innovation Assumption Document (IAD) and, liaises with the Demand Planner, to interrogate the robustness of the volume assumptions.
• Provides SC input on projects business cases: Capex, Conversion costs, Landed costs (for imports), write-off estimates.
• Sign-off from SC stakeholders on Golden Rules breaks and SC risks taken in a project, because of network acceleration.
• Responsible for local transition management planning, for effective management of Innovation Business Waste including obsoletes disposal within set limits.
• Ensures timely initiation and completion of master data workstream in NeCo/MPower
• Communicates and updates SC key stakeholders on Innovation timings, STT, and impact of changes in timings.

Sourcing Responsibilities:

• Complete Sourcing Studies – Comparisons of the landed costs of multiple sourcing sites for a particular African MSO customer. This includes a consideration of formulation and capital outlay, should it be necessary. Once complete, sign off the recommendations with the relevant MSO.
• Co-ordination of third-party procurement activities from scouting of third-party manufacturers (3PMs) to onboarding to executing e-tenders/Requests for Proposals to negotiations and preparation of commercial terms contract 
• Develop the network for the sourcing setup or change.
• Drives the Finished goods resilience agenda for the category across Africa.
• Coordinates the ongoing resilience workstreams required for business continuity and keeps these refreshed and updated.
• Execute (and input into) sourcing strategy as determined by the Category SC team. WL1 owner of Resilience sourcing strategies for the product group.
• Perform Sourcing Strategy analysis to understand potential opportunities for optimization.

Job Requirements
Professional Skills:

• Degree or equivalent experience in SC
• Logistics, Supply Chain (APICS etc) qualification an advantage
• FMCG Supply Chain (Procurement, Planning, Customer Service, Logistics)
• Understanding of and interaction with SC Make / Factory
• Commercial/Financial acumen
• Cross functional business process knowledge
• Excellent communication skills – both written and verbal
• Strong Influencing and stakeholder management skills
• Detail oriented, with strong analytical skills

Preferred:

• Unilever Business Knowledge

Required Experience:

• Tertiary Qualification
• 5-10 Years in Supply Chain operations or Business Analyst role
• Strong written and verbal communication
• Business case development
• Scenario planning
• Strong planning skills, or a strong attitude to planning (foresight, accuracy, attention to detail)
• Finance and business acumen
• Project management
• Team coordination / leadership
• Landing key innovations
• In-depth understanding of Category Strategies.

Key Contact:
Internal:

• Strategic Sourcing Planners for sourcing decisions
• Network Optimisation / E2E Planners for capacity utilisation views
• Brand Marketing for brand strategies and future product portfolios
• R&D Technical innovation leads
• Market Collaboration Planners / E2E Planners on SU Capacity, utilisation, plans, performance, target stock levels,
• Inventory Specialist for RM/PM supply risks & supply contingency plans.
• Demand Planners on demand plans (range forecasts where necessary), target bias & forecast.
• Customer Service Excellence on process & ways of working standards, operating procedures, and targets.
• Process Engineers / SUIT team on capability needs, Capex plans & capacity impact of new technology.
• SC Finance & FET for Business Cases
• Procurement on medium to long term RM/PM supply, supplier selection, 3P contracting.
• 3P SC Ops team for 3P production inputs.