CDI - GLOBAL HEAD OF EDP CATEGORY STRATEGY
Our Take
Define global EDP category strategy for Danone's sustainable growth and long-term competitiveness.
What they’re looking for
- 10+ years in strategy, category leadership, or business development
- FMCG/food & beverage experience strongly preferred
- Experience in global/multi-zone environments required
- Management consultant experience preferred
- Fluent English
Skills & Focus Areas
- strategic thinking
- financial acumen
- communication
- analytical skills
- business cases
- financial modelling
- market signals
- competitive intelligence
As posted by Danone SA
Leadership & Mindset
- Comfortable working under ambiguity and pressure, with autonomy.
- Proven ability to lead through influence, storytelling, and governance.
- Demonstrated track record in leading large‑scale, cross‑functional strategic initiatives.
- Senior strategic leader with the credibility to operate at executive level and influence complex, matrixed organizations.
Skills & Capabilities
- Exceptional strategic thinking and synthesis (able to simplify complexity and drive clarity).
- Strong analytical and financial acumen and value creation orientation. Able to deliver strong business cases and financial modelling.
- Demonstrated fast learner, able to rapidly build mastery on new topics, geographies, or dynamics.
- High level of intellectual curiosity, questioning assumptions and continuously pressure-testing current ways of thinking.
- High‑impact communication skills, both written and oral, at top‑management (c-suite) level.
- Comfortable operating with incomplete information, forming hypotheses and adapting quickly as new signals emerge.
- Comfortable working with consumer data, insights and trends (qualitative and quantitative) to shape category strategies and pressure‑test growth opportunities.
- Fluent english
Experience
- Significant experience (typically 10+ years) in strategy, category leadership, or business development roles. Management consultant experience preferred.
- Demonstrated track record in leading large‑scale, cross‑functional strategic initiatives.
- FMCG and/or food & beverage experience strongly preferred; exposure to global / multi‑zone environments required.
- Marketing experience nice to have
The Head of EDP Category Strategy is accountable for defining, steering, and embedding the global EDP category strategy to deliver sustainable growth, value creation, and long‑term competitiveness for Danone.
The role acts as a strategic thought partner to Category Leadership Team, leads category‑level governance, and mobilizes cross‑functional leaders to translate strategy into impact. The role carries end‑to‑end accountability for strategic planning process, priorities defining and delivery of coordination across functions with a strong external orientation to consumer, channel, health, sustainability, and competitive dynamics specific to EDP.
This role goes beyond internal strategy translation. It brings a decisive outward-looking lens, integrating competitive intelligence, market signals, and ecosystem trends to anticipate disruptions, identify white spaces, and sharpen Danone’s winning choices.
The Head acts as a strategic sparring partner to the Category VP, Global Functions, Zones and CBUs, ensuring that strategic choices are robust vs. competition, anchored in external reality, and converted into clear growth platforms with disciplined execution. The EDP Head will also support the EDP Strategy VP and the EDP Category SVP in PMO (Project Management) and Transformation/Change Management activities.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES & ACCOUNTABILITIES
- Category Strategic Planning
- Define and continuously refine the EDP (Dairy and Plant-based) Category 3–5 year strategy, including diagnosis, ambition, strategic roles, and value creation model.
- Lead the articulation of clear strategic choices (where to play / how to win), grounded in deep understanding of consumers, regulatory environment in which we operate, our value chain, operational footprint, health & sustainability trends, and competitive dynamics across EDP. All of this at the service of both topline growth and bottom-line improvement.
- Act as a strategic integrator, connecting Commercial, Marketing, R&I, Operations, Finance, Sustainability and Zones around a shared ambition and plan.
- Hands-on support platforms (segment and brand leads), commercial and operations as thought partner and in shaping their specific strategies and plans
- Adapting and sharing the strategy for diverse audiences to ensure adoption and change management. Enable strategy deployment through frameworks, playbooks, and capability building, while avoiding over‑complexity and ensuring focus on impact.