Your Job
INVISTA Nylon Polymer customers are located across the globe. Centered in Shanghai, our Nylon Polymer Research and Development team is focused on discovering, evaluating, and commercializing innovative solutions to the world’s toughest challenges, resulting in superior value creation for our business and our customers.
With today’s ever-increasing rate of change, we are transforming our R&D organization to be a competitive advantage for INVISTA. Utilizing our state-of-the-art development facilities in Shanghai, this role will focus on advancing innovative technical solutions to support our global business and manufacturing facilities. Our diverse, cross-functional R&D team will drive value through disciplined application of the Koch innovation framework, critical economic thinking, and differentiated principled entrepreneurship.
We are seeking a Research and Development Lab Manager to advance the capabilities of our Asia Innovation Center (AIC) facility and development team. This person will be a culture champion and a technology-driven leader with a strong history in environmental, health and safety (EHS) excellence. This leader will ensure the safe and disciplined operation of the AIC facility while identifying and developing new capabilities required to deliver value against evolving business needs. This individual will be an important member of our integrated business team, developing strong relationships across regions and capabilities to maximize value creation.
What You Will Do
- Manage the daily operations of the Asia Innovation Center, ensuring all work is completed with EHS excellence, meets all relevant regulatory and compliance requirements, and applies global laboratory best practices.
- Identify opportunities to increase value creation through the acquisition and/or development of new capabilities. Manage the AIC spend and investment plan, with alignment from global R&D leadership, to maximize the business’s return on investment.
- Supervise the Asia Innovation Center development team, coaching each individual to maximize value creation through increased contribution and self-actualization while applying division of labour by comparative advantage and empowering the team to behave as principled entrepreneurs.
- Prioritize AIC test requests based on value creation potential and urgency. Balance competing demands to support innovation program advancement, R&D discovery experimentation, site operations support, and customer troubleshooting.
- Integrate with the global polymer business team to ensure AIC priorities are aligned with business strategies and identify new ways to create and capture value. Ensure the AIC development team internalizes the key drivers and value created by their work and is connected to long-term program outcomes and results. Act as a conduit to increase Nylon Polymer R&D team engagement and collaboration with the other global capabilities (e.g. Yinglon Operations team, Asia Pacific Commercial team).
- Continue to create value through individual contributor responsibilities, including project leadership for facility capital investments and evergreen bench-marking of advancements in pilot laboratory capabilities (technology, data management systems, operating best practices etc.) from industry.
- Champion knowledge and application of Principle Based Management within the global R&D organization, coaching direct reports and peers to advance their capability through both formal and organic interactions.
Who You Are (Basic Qualifications)
- Degree in Chemical Engineering, Polymer Chemistry, Materials Science, or related discipline
- At least 3 years of polymer processing or industrial research experience
- At least 1 year of experience in a managerial or supervisory role
- Interest in polymer applications and growth as a strategic leader
What Will Put You Ahead
- Advanced degree in Chemical Engineering, Polymer Chemistry, Material Science or related discipline
- 5+ years of polymer processing or industrial research experience,
- 3+ years of experience in a managerial or supervisory role
- Previous experience leading a research lab facility and team
At Koch companies, we are entrepreneurs. This means we openly challenge the status quo, find new ways to create value and get rewarded for our individual contributions. Any compensation range provided for a role is an estimate determined by available market data. The actual amount may be higher or lower than the range provided considering each candidate's knowledge, skills, abilities, and geographic location. If you have questions, please speak to your recruiter about the flexibility and detail of our compensation philosophy.
Who We Are
As a Koch company, INVISTA has a long history of working to make the world around you a better place. From parts for the automotive industry to medical equipment, air bags, food packaging and clothing, our ingredients in the nylon 6,6 and polypropylene value chains help bring many of life’s essential products to market.
At Koch, employees are empowered to do what they do best to make life better. Learn how our business philosophy helps employees unleash their potential while creating value for themselves and the company.
Additionally, everyone has individual work and personal needs. We seek to enable the best work environment that helps you and the business work together to produce superior results.