EU Product Management Lead

Job Description

The Product Management Lead is accountable for executional ownership of the European product portfolio within defined scopes, ensuring disciplined product lifecycle management, embedded IBP execution, and monitoring of the delivery of prioritized NPD initiatives in close coordination with the Global NPD Center of Excellence. You will act as portfolio owner and integrator, translating strategy into executable product decisions across NPD, manufacturing, supply chain, finance, and commercial teams.

Key Responsibilities

1. Product Portfolio Management (Core Accountability)

• Own and actively manage assigned European product portfolios, ensuring fit, profitability, and operational efficiency across the lifecycle (additions, simplifications, retirements).
• Lead structured portfolio reviews within the IBP Product Management cycle, presenting clear recommendations on portfolio changes, trade‑offs, and priorities.
• Ensure product portfolio decisions are supported by cost‑to‑serve, capacity, complexity, and margin logic, aligned with IBP governance.
• Maintain and govern the EU product portfolio, ensuring data integrity and usability across categories, markets and plants.
• Contribute to pricing strategy development for the product/category portfolio for ‘open contract’ customers

2. Lightweighting Portfolio Ownership

• Own the European Lightweight product strategy & portfolio, and ensuring readiness and compliance with legislative efforts such as the EU PPWR
• Translate lightweighting trends, customer needs & opportunities into clear product roadmaps, aligned with plant capabilities, asset balance, and cost competitiveness.
• Coordinate with Global NPD CoE, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, and Finance to define global processes and capabilities, production readiness, CAPEX implications, and launch sequencing for lightweighted solutions
• Track and report lightweighting progress, risks, and delivery milestones through IBP Product Management Review.

3. Returnable Bottle Portfolio Management

• Own the product portfolio dimension of European returnable bottle initiatives, within the agreed returnable strategy and in line with the EU (PPWR) legislation and targets
• Lead assessment of returnable product opportunities from a product, asset, and volume perspective, in coordination with commercial and manufacturing stakeholders
• Support pilot design and rollout by defining product standards, specifications, and portfolio implications
• Ensure returnable portfolio decisions are integrated into IBP planning and investment prioritization.

4. IBP Integration & Product Governance

• Act as Product Management owners within IBP, ensuring product decisions are made through the agreed IBP forums and governance model.
• Prepare and present product inputs for IBP cycles, including portfolio changes, NPD progress, and capacity implications with support of the EU NPD COE Lead and other key stakeholders
• Enforce disciplined decision‑making: no product or NPD decisions outside the IBP process.
• Contribute to continuous improvement of IBP‑Product interfaces, filtering processes, templates, and ways of working.

5. NPD CoE Liaison & Delivery Ownership

• Serve as the primary interface between EU Product Management and the NPD Center of Excellence for prioritized European NPD design (creative/container) & NPD projects.
• Partner with the Global NPD COE team to ensure end‑to‑end delivery accountability for assigned NPD projects from approval through industrialization and launch (joint accountability for end-to-end delivery)
• Ensure NPD projects remain aligned with the EU portfolio strategy, IBP priorities, and operational feasibility
• Escalate risks, trade‑offs, and resource constraints clearly to the EU Product Management Director & relevant management teams with fact‑based options.
• Participate in customer meetings as required

6. NPD CAPEX & OPEX Budget Management

• Manage approved NPD CAPEX and OPEX budgets for assigned projects, ensuring alignment with IBP‑approved priorities.
• Track spend versus plan, highlighting variances, risks, and mitigation actions.
• Support business case development and post‑investment reviews in collaboration with Finance and Operations

7. Cross‑Functional Leadership & Stakeholder Management

• Act as a single point of accountability for product topics across Sales, Supply Chain, Manufacturing, Finance, and NPD CoE.
• Provide strategic guidance and coordination to EU-centric EU NPD CoE lead and project managers within global NPD CoE
• Build strong working relationships with the commercial, mould engineering, supply & operations teams to enable execution of portfolio decisions.
• Provide clear, structured communication on product priorities, decisions, and trade‑offs.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in Product Management, Portfolio Management, or NPD leadership within a complex, industrial or FMCG/manufacturing environment
• Strong business and commercial acumen, with the ability to evaluate trade‑offs across profitability, cost‑to‑serve, pricing, and portfolio complexity.
• Proven experience making portfolio‑level decisions that balance growth, margin, operational constraints, across multiple markets and plants in Europe
• Solid understanding of product lifecycle management and portfolio optimization (add, expand, rationalize).
• Comfortable operating in structured governance and IBP‑type decision forums, with the ability to communicate clear, fact‑based recommendations.
• Familiarity with New Product Development (NPD) processes & project management.
• Budget ownership experience, including CAPEX and OPEX management
• Experience related to sustainability, lightweighting, packaging innovation, or returnable systems strongly preferred
• Familiarity with EU regulatory frameworks (e.g., PPWR or similar packaging/environmental legislation) is a strong advantage
• Strong stakeholder management and influencing skills, with experience working cross‑functionally with Sales, Operations, Finance, and Supply Chain.
• Excellent communication skills in English; additional European languages are an advantage

Additional Information