Associate Director, Digital R&D & Innovation - NA

at  KimberlyClark

You were made to do this work: designing new technologies, diving into data, optimizing digital experiences, and constantly developing better, faster ways to get results. You want to be part of a performance culture dedicated to building technology for a purpose that matters. You want to work in an environment that promotes sustainability, inclusion, wellbeing, and career development. In this role, you’ll help us deliver better care for billions of people around the world. It starts with YOU.
As the Digital R&D and Innovation Senior Manager, you will be a self-starter, strategic thinker, creative problem solver and driver of results. This approach to disruptive innovation is new within the NA Consumer (B2C) and Professional (B2B) organization so the individual needs to be flexible, have a growth mindset, and be comfortable with ambiguity. This role will require a high level of stakeholder management and collaboration across the entirety of the organization.
Through this comprehensive role, you will have the unique opportunity to make a significant contribution to the business by leading teams, strengthening innovation, and driving a funnel of ideas to value.
Your leadership will not only influence the trajectory across our portfolio but also cultivate innovation across the organization. Your responsibilities will extend beyond managing and being hands-on in projects; you will be a key architect in building a sustainable innovation ecosystem that nurtures creativity, encourages risk-taking, rewards groundbreaking ideas, and monitors the markets trends.

ABOUT US

Huggies®. Kleenex®. Cottonelle®. Scott®. Kotex®. Poise®. Depend®. Kimberly-Clark Professional®. You already know our legendary brands—and so does the rest of the world. In fact, millions of people use Kimberly-Clark products every day. We know these amazing Kimberly-Clark products wouldn’t exist without talented professionals, like you.
At Kimberly-Clark, you’ll be part of the best team committed to driving innovation, growth, and impact. We’re founded on more than 150 years of market leadership, and we’re always looking for new and better ways to perform – so there’s your open door of opportunity. It’s all here for you at Kimberly-Clark.

SPECIALIZED SKILLS:

• Ability to engage in rapid prototype development using iterative techniques.
• Direct experience managing relationships with outsourcing and consulting partners.
• Expertise in leveraging AI and ML for predictive analytics, automating processes, and enhancing decision-making, ensuring solutions are both innovative and data driven.
• Deep understanding of cloud solutions and architectures, enabling scalable, flexible, and resilient digital infrastructures that support rapid innovation and development.

SOFT SKILLS AND OTHERS:

• Demonstrated skills in application delivery, client relationship management, and maintaining high cross-cultural awareness.
• Proficient in English with outstanding written and verbal communication skills, capable of strong collaboration across teams and departments.

IN THIS ROLE, YOU WILL:

• Drive R&D and innovation strategy for the NA Consumer, B2B, Thinx $11B+ business through best-in-class Engineering and Application capabilities and products, implement differentiated technologies and support business operations to enable $11B+ NA business growth.
• Lead innovation strategy aligned with business goals. Explore new digital opportunities to disrupt the market and gain a competitive edge.
• Foster a culture of creativity and improvement. Lead innovation hackathons, use design thinking and agile methodologies to validate ideas that meet market needs and business objectives.
• Oversee innovation projects from ideation to commercialization. Define project scopes, timelines, budgets, and deliverables. Ensure effective resource allocation.
• Build and maintain relationships with key internal and external stakeholders. Bridge gaps between areas of expertise to drive collaborative innovation to product teams.
• Monitor technologies, trends, and market dynamics. Use insights to inform innovation strategy. Identify and establish relationships with strategic partners.
• Define and manage a connected R&D data-driven ecosystem integrated across the value chain.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Strategic Innovation Leadership: Lead the development and execution of the NA disruptive technological innovation strategy, aligning it with overarching business goals. You will spearhead cross-functional teams to explore and validate new digital opportunities that can disrupt the consumer, the market, the industry, business models and provide us with a competitive edge.
• Idea Generation & Validation: Foster a culture of creativity and continuous improvement, encouraging the generation of innovative ideas and concepts. Lead innovation hackathons and utilize design thinking and agile methodologies to validate and bring these ideas to life, ensuring they meet market needs and business objectives.
• Portfolio Management & Execution: Lead the innovative portfolio, from ideation to commercialization (business value delivery). This includes defining project scopes, timelines, budgets, and deliverables, as well as ensuring the effective allocation of resources. This is expected to be done following leveraging the Innovation framework that encompasses an agile mindset.
• Collaboration & Stakeholder Engagement: Build and maintain strong relationships with key internal and external stakeholders, including R&D, marketing, IT (cloud and infrastructure), and external innovation partners. Your role will be crucial in bridging gaps between different areas of expertise to drive collaborative innovation to products teams.
• Market Intelligence & Analysis: Managed watchtower on emerging technologies, industry trends, and market dynamics. Leverage these insights to inform our innovation strategy and ensure our solutions remain at the forefront of digital commercial advancements. Front runner in strategic partners identification and relation establishment.

In one of our technical roles, you’ll focus on winning with consumers and the market, while putting safety, mutual respect, and human dignity at the center. To succeed in this role, you will need the following qualifications:

• 5+ years of hands-on experience in designing and developing end-to-end cloud solutions.
• Proven experience with architectural design patterns such as Microservices, APIs, event-driven data flows, serverless architectures, containers, connectivity, and device management.
• Proven experience experimenting and unlocking new digital frontiers. Stablish the pipeline strategy for innovation to value proven delivery.
• Demonstrated expertise in industry standards for securing digital products.
• Deep understanding of designing solutions for scalability and resiliency.
• Comprehensive knowledge of state-of-the-art technologies such as Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPT) for natural language processing (NPL), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML) algorithms for predictive analytics, seamless cloud-to-cloud integrations for scalable infrastructure, and GraphQL for efficient data queries and APIs.
• Proven track record in creating scalable and available cloud services using platforms like Azure.
• Strong familiarity with Agile and Product team workflows, including epics, features, stories, sprints, and backlog management.
• Dissecting complex challenges, crafting visionary strategies, and leveraging data-driven insights to guide decision-making and achieve impactful outcomes