Job Introduction
To improve the quality, ownership and use of master data across the business, so that teams can work more efficiently, make better decisions and rely on consistent information.
The role combines hands-on responsibility for Food master data and costing assurance with wider leadership of master data governance, process improvement and business change. It will help ensure that data is accurate from the outset, responsibilities are clear and agreed ways of working are embedded across the business.
The role will focus on three areas:
- Food master data and costing assurance – approximately 40%
- Master data strategy, governance and improvement – approximately 40%
- Support for projects and business change – approximately 20%
Working with functional leaders, data owners and specialist teams, the role will provide the structure, challenge and support needed to improve data quality, strengthen controls and deliver sustainable change.
Role Responsibility
Food master data and costing:
- Food master data – Manage and validate Food master data, ensuring it is accurate from the outset and flows correctly into costing, reporting and operational processes.
- Costing assurance – Maintain appropriate costing controls, validate agreed costings and investigate discrepancies, working with NFD, Finance and operational teams to resolve root causes. Be a lead in standard costing and identifying discrepancies from P74 & Syspro. Fully understand labour model and be able to explain challenges with costings.
- Food process control – Embed clear data, costing and approval controls into Food and Innovation processes, reducing manual error and supporting audit, food safety and BRC requirements. Support in site change management to ensure master data is accurately maintained.
- Innovation process expertise – Act as the business subject matter expert for data and master data within the Innovation process.
- Operational improvement – Identify and address data or process weaknesses that create costing errors, delays, duplicated effort or unreliable reporting. These include P74 improvements and how it links into Syspro/planning.
The role provides costing assurance, process ownership and exception resolution. It is not responsible for routine day-to-day costing administration, day-to-day Food project management or product development activity.
Master data strategy, governance and improvement:
- Operating model and governance – Own and improve the standards, ownership model, controls and governance approach for agreed master data areas.
- Ownership and accountability – Establish clear roles and responsibilities with functional leaders and data owners, ensuring agreed standards and processes are understood and followed.
- Data quality and assurance – Define and monitor measures for accuracy, completeness and quality, coordinate exception resolution and escalate recurring issues.
- Strategy and improvement roadmap – Maintain a prioritised roadmap of master data improvements based on business value, risk and operational impact.
- Process integration and reporting – Ensure master data requirements are built into relevant processes and SOPs, and that key reporting attributes and definitions are controlled at source.
- Automation and adoption – Work with business and technical specialists to simplify and automate processes, while providing guidance, training and follow-up to support adoption.
Support for projects and business change:
- Change Council participation – Act as a Change Council Lead for Master Data, helping to shape and prioritise the business change agenda.
- Project support and business alignment – Support projects and change initiatives that create, change or depend upon master data, ensuring requirements, ownership, controls and operational impacts are understood.
- Change and adoption – Support communication, implementation, training and follow-up for new processes and ways of working, while functional leaders remain accountable for adoption within their teams.
The Ideal Candidate
Experience:
Essential
- Experience improving and embedding cross-functional business processes in a complex operational environment, including communication, training and adoption.
- Experience working with master data or other business-critical product, ingredient, recipe, costing, customer, supplier or operational information.
- Experience validating information, investigating discrepancies and improving controls at source.
- Strong stakeholder management and influencing skills across senior, operational and specialist teams.
- Experience defining clear ownership, processes, controls, escalation routes and measures of success.
- Ability to translate unclear business problems into practical requirements and improvement plans.
- Experience identifying and addressing the root causes of recurring data or process issues.
Desirable
- Experience in food manufacturing, FMCG, retail supply chain, NPD, technical, quality, supply chain or commercial operations.
- Experience in a regulated or audited environment were product, allergen, nutritional, packaging or customer-facing information must be controlled.
- Exposure to ERP, MRP, PIM, PLM, workflow, reporting or integration projects from a business or process perspective.
- Experience supporting continuous improvement, lean, business analysis, process mapping or project delivery.
- Experience establishing governance forums, ownership models or cross-functional improvement roadmaps.
Qualifications - No formal qualification is required. Relevant experience in business process improvement, master data, business analysis, or continuous improvement is more important.
Skills:
Essential
- Strong attention to detail, with the ability to identify data gaps, inconsistencies, costing anomalies and process weaknesses.
- Strong numerical and commercial awareness, with the ability to review costings and identify unusual or inconsistent results.
- Ability to understand how product, recipe and ingredient data affects costing, reporting and operational decisions.
- Ability to establish clear ownership, standards, controls, workflows and governance.
- Ability to document processes, requirements, decisions and responsibilities clearly.
- Strong communication, facilitation and influencing skills across different functions and levels of seniority.
- Ability to translate data and process issues into clear business impacts, priorities and practical actions.
- Able to work independently, manage competing priorities and escalate decisions when required.
- Able to balance effective control with business pace and practical delivery.
- Comfortable working with IT, Data and system specialists without needing to be a technical developer.
- Confident using Excel and Microsoft Office tools in a business environment.
Desirable
- Understanding of Power BI, reporting datasets or data platforms from a business-user or requirements perspective.
- Awareness of how well-controlled master data supports trusted reporting, integration, automation and AI.
- Knowledge of process mapping, continuous improvement, change management or business analysis techniques.
- Understanding of data ownership, governance, quality measures and exception management.
Attributes:
- Structured, organised and able to create clarity from unclear or inconsistent processes.
- Pragmatic and delivery-focused, balancing control, business pace and user adoption.
- Confident challenging existing ways of working constructively and professionally.
- Curious about how the business operates and motivated by improving efficiency, control and decision-making.
- Collaborative and credible across functions, building trust with data owners, administrators, senior stakeholders and specialist teams.
- Resilient and persistent when resolving cross-functional issues where ownership or accountability is unclear.
- Comfortable working through influence rather than direct authority.
- Personable, helpful and engaged, with a practical, can-do approach.
- Focused on sustainable improvement rather than short-term fixes.
- Committed to creating a respectful and inclusive workplace that embraces and values diversity.