Protea Recruitment Ltd | Food | Drinks | FMCG Recruitment Partner
New Product Development Manager
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New Product Development Manager
NPD Manager – Product Development
Location: Glasgow Contract: Permanent | Full-Time
About the Role
We’re looking for a NPD Manager to join a growing Product Development team. Perfect for someone seeking their next career step, a change of product focus, or simply ready for a new challenge. In this role, you’ll help shape the innovation pipeline, lead a team of Product Developers, and bring new products from concept through to launch for private-label and branded partners. Experience in manufacturing leadership is prioritised over past product-specific experience.
This customer-facing position requires you to build strong relationships, understand customer requirements, and translate them into commercially successful products. You’ll collaborate closely with cross-functional teams to ensure projects align with technical, regulatory, and commercial goals.
If you thrive on combining hands-on product development with team leadership, this role offers a balanced mix of creativity, strategy, and people management.
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Key Responsibilities
Leadership & Team Management
- Lead, support, and develop a team of Product Developers
- Set clear objectives, priorities, and progression plans
- Foster a collaborative, creative, and high-performing team culture
- Manage workloads and resources across multiple concurrent projects
Product Development & Innovation
- Deliver the NPD pipeline and innovation plans for brands and customer accounts
- Ensure all development projects meet commercial, technical, regulatory, and customer requirements
- Oversee testing, evaluation, and continuous improvement of new and existing formulations
Project & Stakeholder Management
- Create detailed product, packaging, and labelling briefs
- Work cross-functionally with Marketing, Sales, Operations, Procurement, Regulatory, and Manufacturing
- Maintain an accurate rolling project pipeline with clear updates and timelines
Commercial & Strategic Responsibility
- Own product costing, margin management, and commercial viability throughout development
- Negotiate with suppliers and manufacturing partners to secure favourable outcomes
- Contribute to wider product and innovation strategy
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Key Skills
- Strong leadership and people management
- Project management expertise
- Negotiation and influencing skills
- Excellent organisation and prioritisation
- High attention to detail
- Ability to manage multiple priorities
- Strong communication and presentation skills
- Proactive, solutions-focused mindset
- Positive, collaborative attitude
Ideal Candidate
You’ll be an experienced NPD candidate with:
- Proven leadership experience
- A track record of delivering successful products
- Experience managing complex, multi-project workloads
- Cross-functional collaboration expertise
- Ability to balance creativity with commercial awareness
We’re open to candidates with experience in Personal care, Food, Dairy, Bottling, Canning, or multi-complex products.
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