Head of Technical

**Head of Technical**

£80,000 to £100,000 plus great benefits including 10% employer pension contribution, private healthcare for you and your family, and a company car or £6,000 car allowance (Work Level 4)

Manchester City Centre, in this role you’ll work in a hybrid way splitting your time between home, the office at least once a week and at least 2 days a week travelling nationwide to our supplier base (find out more about our hybrid working policy at colleagues.coop.co.uk/hybrid-working-policy).

We’re looking for a Head of Technical to join our food propositions team here at Co-op. In this role you’ll lead a team who will deliver technical excellence, protecting Co-op’s brand quality and reputation. We’ll look to you to be connected to any external industry discussions, making sure that Co-op are at the cutting edge of sustainable and resilient food systems and supply chains. This role provides an exciting opportunity to trial new ways of working and to be part of the fastest growing own brand in the current market.

**What you’ll do**
- Work with supplier partners to make sure Co-op products are made with technical excellence at the heart
- Contribute to the strategic planning for the food business, making sure that food safety and technical excellence are at the heart of this
- Engage with the wider food industry, making sure we are at the forefront of insight, science, and knowledge on the future of food
- Be engaged and up to date with any regulation changes, making sure that everything we do is safe, legal, and compliant
- Appropriately manage and prioritise risk in high-pressured situations, making sure regulations are followed and strategically plan to negate future risk to our company and brand
- Lead a team to successfully deliver against our strategy and goals, whilst developing people on the job
- Look for opportunities to help the team to continuously improve from a food safety perspective
- Actively manage our supply base, making visits nationwide

**This role would suit people who have**
- Extensive experience working in food safety
- Extensive experience in Food technical roles
- The ability to network and build relationships with the food industry and supplier base whilst also managing manufacturing sites
- Previous experience leading a team in a fast paced and collaborative environment

**Why Co-op?**

If you have the skills that we need, we can offer you a competitive salary and great benefits package which includes 30% off Co-op branded products in our food stores (as well as other discounts on Co-op products and services).
- An annual bonus (based on personal and business performance)
- 28 days holiday (rising to 32 with service) plus bank holidays
- A pension with up to 10% employer contributions
- Private healthcare for you and your family
- Access to a subsidised onsite gym (at our Manchester HQ)
- Coaching and training to support your career development
- Wagestream app - giving you access to a percentage of your pay as you earn

At Co-op, we’re proud to do things a different way. As one of the world’s largest co-operatives, owned by millions of members, community is at the heart of what we do. Since our Co-op was founded in 1844, we’ve had a clear social purpose, and everything we do as a business helps to build a fairer world for our members, customers, colleagues, and communities.

**Building a diverse environment**

We'll ask whether you’d like to be considered under the Disability Confident scheme when you apply.

If we invite you to take part in the recruitment process for any of our jobs, we’ll ask you if you need any reasonable adjustments to enable you to participate.

You can find out more about our recruitment process at jobs.coop.co.uk/apply-process

You can find out more about the Disability Confident scheme and all our commitments to diversity and inclusion at colleagues.coop.co.uk/diversity-inclusion-and-wellbeing