Director, Product Safety (Research & Development)

You've picked a great time to join Avon. We're the company that puts purpose, people and relationships at the heart of everything we do. The company that's 135 years young and only just getting started. As part of the Natura &Co family, we're committed to being the best beauty company for the world by generating a positive environmental, economic and social impact for our communities across the globe.

Role Type

Regular/Permanent

What you'll be doing:

High profile position with very broad scope of responsibility, high complexity and high impact. Responsible for ensuring that Avon's products can be used safely by our customers and for preserving Avon's Brand and Corporate reputation whilst also maintaining business continuity. Requires insightful analysis of complex scientific data across multiple scientific disciplines. Requires management of internal/external relationships to perform responsibilities. The role impacts ALL markets and has significant financial & operational impact.

Leads a team of 18 safety (toxicology, clinical safety & microbiology) professionals based in the UK and Poland responsible for:
• Working in collaboration across R&D functions to facilitate innovation
• Ensuring all CFT & nutritional products are safe under conditions of foreseeable consumer use/misuse
• Ensuring all F&H products in all markets with potential for chemical/microbiological exposure are safe under conditions of foreseeable consumer use/misuse
• Facilitating compliance of all CFT & nutritional products with applicable ingredient/product safety regulatory requirements pertaining to product safety
• Establishing applicable safety–based ingredient & product specifications
• Qualification of all new cosmetic ingredients including establishing specifications and restrictions on use
• Minimizing the environmental impact of chemicals used in Avon's products & packaging components
• Working in collaboration with Sourcing, Planning and QA to maintain business continuity
• Completion of product safety assessments to facilitate successful on–time notification or pre–market approval (registration) of new products and avoidance of any delay in product launch
• Anticipating the significance/impact of new scientific data on product safety and responding accordingly.
• Maintain brand & corporate reputation
• Avoid of regulatory enforcement actions resulting from safety issue/concern.
• Avoidance of supply chain disruption including destruction of existing product inventory,
• No withdrawal of product from the market, product recall, monetary and/or criminal penalties because of product safety

Key responsibilities:

Principal Duties:

Leads Product Safety teams based in UK & Poland.
Develops and implements vision/strategy, allocates resources and holds teams accountable for execution.
Maintains awareness of scientific developments (particularly as they relate to consumer product safety) in toxicology, environmental toxicology, cosmetic microbiology, clinical safety testing and risk assessment to ensure Avon's product safety/risk assessment processes/criteria remain state–of the art.
Maintains awareness of emerging ingredient/product safety regulatory developments and collaborates with Regulatory Affairs to develop/implement appropriate response strategies.
Ensures new scientific literature on existing ingredients is adequately monitored and evaluated to determine impact on pre–existing safety assessments. Collaborates with product development teams and works with upstream partners to steer future pipeline development.
Ensures safety assessments of new ingredients and products are thorough and robust and comply with specific regulatory requirements.
Ensures proper development and application of product use instructions and warning statements where necessary.
Anticipates business impact of decisions, engages relevant stakeholders, develops clear and insightful analysis and communicates to relevant leaders in R&D, Marketing, Supply Chain.
Develops and implements strategy to avoid or mitigate negative business impact whilst ensuring consumer safety.
Develops ingredient and product safety specifications and collaborates with Supply Chain Quality Assurance to implement quality assurance requirements. Represents Avon's position in key industry groups/trade associations. When necessary, interacts directly with regulatory agencies.
Develops Representative/Consumer communication materials on product safety/safety testing issues.
Develops and implements Global Product Safety & Regulatory Affairs policies and procedures.
Ensures compliance with internal controls and the Code of Business Conduct and Ethics.

Job Requirements:

PhD in Toxicology or related scientific discipline
15 years cosmetics industry product safety responsibilities
Deep understanding of interpretation of complex data in multiple scientific disciplines
Broad & deep product safety & risk assessment technical expertise including familiarity with NAMs and NGRAs
Familiarity with global cosmetics & EU chemical regulatory requirements
Ability to achieve results through influencing of others
Excellent communication skills (to inform and to influence)
Requires understanding and interpretation of company, regional & market–specific strategic business direction. Requires deep understanding of Global R&D product development processes and Supply Chain operations. Requires engagement with other functional stakeholders to develop and implement Marketing/R&D/Supply Chain strategies.
Highly complex position requiring management of both professionals and managers in two geographic locations on multiple short–term and long–term projects. Personally inspire confidence and inspire confidence in the Avon Product Safety team. Convey a vision of excellence. Must ensure safety decisions & actions taken reflect Avon values. Ability to communicate safety decisions with credibility, diplomacy and a high degree of transparency. Ability to prioritize and good project–management skills essential. Requires significant strategic planning ability, initiative, decisiveness & good judgment. Must have intellectual curiosity and a questioning mindset.
Requires exceptional analytical/reasoning skills. Must be comfortable with complexity, ambiguity
Required to make recommendations of a highly technical nature which will impact safety of consumers and R&D strategy. Must make day–to–day tactical decisions on allocation of resources and resolution of scientific technical issues related to product safety, regulatory compliance and Supply Chain (Sourcing & QA) operations
Decisions impact the safety of Avon's consumers, legal liability, regulatory compliance and Brand/Corporate reputation.
Decisions impact likelihood of business disruption and destruction of existing product inventory as a result of failure to anticipate impact of new scientific data on product safety/regulatory compliance
Decisions impact likelihood of regulatory enforcement action resulting in supply chain disruption, withdrawal of product from the market, product recall, monetary and/or criminal penalties
Decisions impact likelihood of on–time pre–market approval (registration) or notification of new products and thus avoidance of any delay in product launch
Regularly interfaces with and influences R&D/Supply Chain, VPs, Directors, external technical legal advisors, consultants. Must be able to build relationships throughout R&D and across the global organization based on credibility and mutual respect. Must be collaborative yet can challenge. Honesty, integrity and drive for transparency are essential characteristics.
Requires excellent communication skills (to inform and to influence) on highly complex subjects. Must be able to communicate risk–assessment concepts and practical applications to a non–technical audience with credibility.
Can operate globally and be sensitive and welcoming to diversity of thought. Failure to successfully manage relationships may have a significant impact on Avon's business operations, profitability and/or corporate reputation.
Must build & maintain effective external relationships with key trade associations, government agency, notification agency and competitor company personnel to directly or indirectly influence emerging product safety related legislation/regulations.
Decisions impact all Avon's CFT, nutritional products and some F&H products across all markets thus potential for highly significant financial & operational impact, legal liability and corporate reputation.

We'd love you to have:

High profile position with very broad scope of responsibility, high complexity and high impact. Responsible for ensuring that Avon's products can be used safely by our customers and for preserving Avon's Brand and Corporate reputation whilst also maintaining business continuity. Requires insightful analysis of complex scientific data across multiple scientific disciplines. Requires management of internal/external relationships to perform responsibilities. The role impacts ALL markets and has significant financial & operational impact.

Leads a team of 18 safety (toxicology, clinical safety & microbiology) professionals based in the UK and Poland responsible for:

Working in collaboration across R&D functions to facilitate innovation
Ensuring all CFT & nutritional products are safe under conditions of foreseeable consumer use/misuse
Ensuring all F&H products in all markets with potential for chemical/microbiological exposure are safe under conditions of foreseeable consumer use/misuse . click apply for full job details