Sensory Panel Leader

Join us and celebrate the beauty of human experience. Create for happier, healthier lives, with love for nature. Together, with passion and creativity, we deliver food innovations, craft inspired fragrances and develop beauty and wellbeing solutions. There’s much to learn and many to learn from, with more than 16,800 employees around the world to explore ideas and ambitions with. Every day, your talent, your innovative spirit, and your determination will shape our future, making a positive difference on billions of people. Every essence of you enriches our world. We are Givaudan. Human by nature.  

Sensory Panel Leader - Naarden (The Netherlands)
 

As Sensory Panel Leader you will be part of the Consumer Sensory Insight Europe team, taking care of sensory projects. You will be responsible for leading, reporting and often presenting Sensory Insights related to proactive and reactive projects in Europe. The results of these tests will support Marketing, Sales and Technical teams to create and promote winning solutions to our customers. In this role, you will work closely with the sensory panel team members, local and regional team members from cross functional teams. 

Givaudan is committed to equal opportunities. Therefore, we explicitly welcome applications regardless of cultural and social background, gender, age, religion or sexual identity. We also have a safe working environment, progressive working conditions and are certified as an equal pay employer.

The main activities in this role:
High quality Sensory Insights delivery
•    Lead and execute reactive and proactive sensory tests;
•    Lead and conduct descriptive and discriminative expert sensory panel sessions according to Givaudan best practices;
•    Collaborate with CSI Europe and technical team members to coordinate schedules of all tests;
•    Maintain accurate records of all tasting sessions;
•    Identify the right testing methodology and design tests according to project objectives;
•    Analyze results, write reports and deliver results to the key stakeholders for discriminative and descriptive tests.
 

Sensory Panel Management
•    Manage internal and external panels and maintain panelist motivation;
•    Track panel performance and provide appropriate training for the panel to capture high quality sensory insights;
•    Work closely with the CSI manager to manage the project pipeline and ensure efficient usage of panel timeslots;
•    Maintain our proprietary flavour language library;
•    Lead other panels when needed and interact closely with other panel leaders to improve and align CSI Europe panel leading skills, methodologies and sensory insights quality;
•    Ensure low turnover of expert panel and, when needed, organize new panelist recruitment.
 

CSI Functional Excellence Contribution
•    Organize Lab tours, presentations about panel activities, and Sense-It® training sessions for internal and external stakeholders;
•    Participate in cross-segment CSI capability projects;
•    Contribute to the development of Sensory Insights Technicians.

You have:
•    A bachelor or master degree in Sensory, Food Science/technology or related fields
•    +2 years of panel leading experience or equivalent is preferred
•    Knowledge and interest in sensory techniques
•    Strong analytical skills and good statistical knowledge
•    Experience in XL-stat, Fizz and Compusense is a plus
•    Excellent written and verbal communication skills in Dutch and English
•    Easily connects with colleagues and a natural networker with a strong team spirit
•    Likes to take on responsibility and able to drive projects and lead groups of people

At Givaudan, you contribute to delightful taste and scent experiences that touch people’s lives. You work within an inspiring teamwork culture – where you can thrive, collaborate and learn from other talented and passionate people across disciplines, regions and divisions. Every essence of you enriches our world. Diversity drives innovation and creates closer connections with our employees, customers and partners. Givaudan embraces diversity and is committed to building an inclusive environment where everyone impacts our world.