Position Summary
The New Product Project Management team at Kendo leads the new product launches from concept to delivery. The Manager is responsible for driving communication and problem-solving to help deliver the best products possible while balancing scope, time and cost with agility. They help the teams share their voice and deliver tasks on time to keep projects on track. Strong partnerships with the Product Development, Packaging, Creative, Sourcing, Supply Chain, Brand teams and our external suppliers ensure successful new product launches.
With their New Product Development (NPD) timeline expertise, the NPPM Manager also helps improve the NPD process by collaborating with the cross functional teams to fix inefficiencies and set the teams up for success for their brand.
Requirements
- Requires 5-7 years leading new product launches in consumer-packaged goods (CPG) – Cosmetics, Personal Care, or Health & Beauty preferred.
- Project management experience working with global contract manufacturers and internal cross functional teams required.
- Experience with Change Management, Product Development, Packaging Development, or Supply Chain a plus.
- Proficient with Smartsheet for timeline management or other project management software (MS Project, Asana, etc.).
- Demonstrated ability to prioritize and manage dozens of projects while driving accountability with partners.
Responsibilities
Job responsibilities
Day-to-day Project Management
- Responsible for establishing a SmartSheet timeline for each new product launch from development to delivery across multiple channels and brands, complete with dependencies/predecessors, owners, deadlines, and durations.
- Clearly communicate project status, risk and feasibility to teams and leadership to drive project decision-making in a timely manner.
- Lead proactive problem solving while driving completion of all deliverables with the cross functional teams to mitigate issues that may impact project cost, time and quality.
- Lead key tactical (Ops, vendor calls, cross functional team meetings)
- Build strong partnerships with all internal and external stakeholders in order to establish project plans.
- Create and maintain the project tracker, the project source of truth used to drive project visibility and discussion.
- As an NPD timeline subject matter expert, responsible for understanding and evaluating the end-to-end process and making recommendations on how it can be improved.
- Perform project post-mortems to identify key learnings and takeaways.
Additional Information
Kendo Holdings, Inc. is a San Francisco-based beauty brand developer and wholesaler owned by LVMH Moët Hennessy - Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest luxury group. A play on the words “can do”, Kendo has become the hub of creativity and next generation beauty product development for global Sephora channels and selective retailers outside of Sephora.
Through original development, collaborations and acquisitions the Kendo stable of brands will always be creative, inspiring and innovative. A dynamic engine of speed, expertise and market-savvy, the Kendo team continues to redefine the beauty industry through great product, great storytelling, great retail and direct-to-consumer partnerships. This shows up in everything we do and in what we stand for:
- “Can Do” Spirit: We work together to make our wildest dreams a reality: As entrepreneurs, we embrace optimism and find creative ways to reach our goals
- Advocacy, Diversity, and Inclusion: We recognize and celebrate the full spectrum of personal identities. We create safe spaces so everyone’s voice is heard. We listen with humility and act with courage.
- Storytelling: We tell authentic stories like no, one else. It’s our key to inspire trust and build relationships, rallying, our people, partners, and consumers around our brands.
- Resilience: We embrace challenges as opportunities. Change is ever- constant, and agility is our strength.
- Product Excellence: We put the consumers first: We constantly raise the bar to create products of the highest quality that everyone just has to have.
The salary range for this position is $105,700 - $132,000 per year based upon a San Francisco location. Offered salary is dependent upon experience and location. Kendo Total Rewards offerings also include an annual bonus and a comprehensive benefits package including: medical, dental and vision insurance, flex paid time off program, parental leave, employee discount/perks, a retirement plan with employer contributions, Summer Fridays, opportunity to work from anywhere for two weeks in the summer and July and December wellness/shutdown weeks for applicable positions.
