Chief Impact Officer

Chief Impact Officer

EIT Food

Remote, Europe

EIT Food is the world’s largest and most dynamic food innovation community. We create connections across the food system that stimulate new ideas and innovations to drive change. Supported by the EU, we invest in projects, organisations and individuals that share our goals for a healthy and sustainable food system. Our projects and programmes are delivered with a combination of industry, education and research partners and participants to bring innovation to the key challenges across the Food System by developing solutions that align with our three missions – healthier lives through food, net zero food system, and reducing risk for a fair and resilient food system.

The Chief Impact Officer (CIO) leads the delivery of our programmes and projects, aligned to our three Missions. They are responsible for leading our Impact teams to design and deliver programmes which will have a material impact on Europe’s food systems. This includes our education programmes, our start-up accelerators and support for entrepreneurs, large scale consortia-led innovation projects, and our unique Public Insights and Engagement platforms. This is a pivotal role for EIT Food, ensuring that we stretch our ambition for food systems transformation, and create innovative and impactful programmes. Your leadership will shape the impact we have as an organisation, as Europe’s largest food innovation community, and as one of the key players in the future of our food system.

Your work is integral to the success of our organisation and you will work closely with all areas of EIT Food. Our partnership and community are key to delivering impact, so you will design and deliver programmes in collaboration with the Chief Partnership Officer’s teams. Our brand gives you leverage for promoting our activities, and engaging startups, students and the innovation community in our portfolio, so you are a key stakeholder for our Brand and Communications teams. Since we are delivering predominantly with grant funding, you will lead teams to create a culture of operation excellence, partnering closely with our COO and CFO. And most critically, you are a highly visible leader across the food ecosystem, promoting innovation as a lever or change and championing food system transformation.

As outlined above, our success in food systems transformation is your success, and your success depends on strong collaborative relationships with your peers in the C-Suite and the leaders across EIT Food with whom Impact have close dependencies. Your leadership is built on foundations of collaboration, ambition and a continual desire for impact, and in this role, you will inspire and lead us and our community to deliver transformation change through innovation.

THE POSITION WITHIN THE ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE

Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), the CIO is a full member of the Executive Management Team (EMT), expected to make a full contribution as an executive within EIT Food. Your direct reports will include:

• The Director of Innovation who is responsible for the organisation’s Innovation team and consortia-led innovation projects;
• The Director of Business Creation who is responsible for the organisation’s Business Creation team, including Entrepreneurship, Investment and Corporate Venturing. This team has a key dependency on Regional teams and a high level of integration opportunity;
• The Director of Education who is responsible for the organisation’s Education team, including EIT Community education programmes and non-EIT funded programmes such as Ecotrophilia and several Erasmus + projects;
• The Director of Public Engagement who is responsible for the organisation’s Public Engagement team, delivering the Consumer Observatory and Food Unfolded, both of which are exploring opportunities to become financially self-sustaining;
• The Director of Missions and Strategic Programmes who is responsible for the organisation’s Mission-led approach, creating a mission-aligned call process, and has Mission Leads to create a strategy and delivery plan for each Mission;
• The Director of EIT Community, responsible for EIT Food’s full portfolio of EIT Community work, including our lead work on Strategic Synergies cluster and our support work on other clusters.

MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES

You will lead the Impact Office, encompassing innovation, business creation, public engagement, education, and missions and strategic programmes. This role requires an astute understanding of the food innovation ecosystem, the ability to navigate complexity, and the experience to influence senior stakeholders across academia, industry, RTOs, NGOs and startups. Your leadership will not only drive EIT Food’s growth but will also shape the future of food innovation across Europe.

• You will oversee the development and execution of strategy for our portfolios and programmes, ensuring that EIT Food’s projects not only accelerates breakthrough innovations but are positioned for commercial success. By driving innovation pipelines from concept to market, you will help unlock new revenue streams and societal value.
• You will oversee the development of robust performance frameworks to track and measure the impact of EIT Food’s initiatives as well as the intellectual assets and property (IP) management;
• Science-to-Business: you understand the importance of translating academic and RTOs achievements into industry & commercial impact. You are able to build bridges between science and technology & business ecosystems;
• Together with the EMT and Directors across the organisation, you will be working on creating cross-sectors partnerships and support the alignment of Impact activities to improve the impact of our portfolio, enhance partner and participant satisfaction, and maximise the potential for scale up and complementarity across our work. For example, boosting regional programmes such as EWA so that they can be deployed across the whole of Europe, and creating stronger regional traction for core Impact programmes such as our accelerators and Education courses;
• You focus on creating a culture of operational excellence, working with the Finance and Operations business partners to identify and resolve issues, improve processes, and communicate to set expectations;
• Ensure your teams have clear plans to deliver on our KPIs and metrics, including funder-specific objectives and multi-year impact goals;
• Leadership: you will be working with the HR Director to ensure all Impact Directors have clear performance objectives, and that they are given clear performance feedback and support as needed throughout the year, including personal development plans.

CANDITATE PROFILE

You are a strategic leader, able to drive a long-term impact strategy. You have proven experience at C-level with a track record of impact delivery in the food and innovation sectors. You are familiar with measurable impact metrics and scalable solutions. You have led diverse, cross-functional, cross-location teams fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration and continuous improvement.

This role is a unique opportunity for a leader to step into a critical role, where they can focus on building the relationships across the organisation which will enable the Impact teams to perform excellently. You will be working with a strong team of Impact Directors who can run the business day to day, with your support to make connections, remove blockers, and inspire the team.

You will have a clear understanding of the direction we are taking with our Impact teams, and the confidence to engage across the organisation to integrate our activities and align our priorities.

You have great collaboration capabilities, which you can bring to life with examples from your professional experience. Of course, you need to be able to solve complex problems, working collaboratively with colleagues across the organisation, and be a great communicator.

This is a C-Level role, so your leadership capability is very important. You are able to articulate your philosophy as a leader, and able to draw on experience leading in different situations. You can bring a diverse team together, and most importantly: build collaborative relationships across an organisation to enable your team to be successful. At the same time, you will be hands-on, and you will need to be comfortable in our processes and systems.

WHAT WE OFFER

Working at EIT Food means joining a team of like-minded individuals who are dedicated to creating a better future through food innovation. We cultivate a culture of collaboration, inventiveness, inclusivity, and constructive feedback. All employees are encouraged to contribute their ideas and expertise towards our mission of creating a more sustainable and inclusive food system.

Together, we’re making a real impact on the food industry and we’re looking for talented individuals like you to join us.

As a valued member of our team, we’ll provide you with a competitive salary and comprehensive benefits package.

CONTRACT TYPE

Full-time permanent position.

LOCATION & TRAVEL FREQUENCY

You can be based in any of our EIT Food offices with the possibility to work remotely.

Frequent travel within Europe.

Please note that all applicants must be legally authorized to reside and work in Europe.

APPLICATION

Interested candidates are asked to upload their CV and Cover Letter in English in electronic format to CV Warehouse before 3/11/2024.

Shortlisted candidates may be invited for an interview and may be asked to prove their background, qualifications, skills and experiences by providing relevant documents.

EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES

EIT Food is an equal opportunity employer, offering each candidate matching the minimum obligatory qualifications and experiences an equal chance in employment and promotion procedures.

Apply Now