Job Detail

About Coty Inc  

Coty is one of the world’s largest beauty companies with approximately $9 billion in revenue, with a purpose to celebrate and liberate the diversity of consumers’ beauty. Its strong entrepreneurial heritage has created an iconic portfolio of leading beauty brands. Coty is the global leader in fragrance, a strong number two in professional salon hair color & styling, and number three in color cosmetics. Coty operates three divisions – Coty Consumer Beauty, which is focused on color cosmetics, retail hair coloring and styling products, body care and mass fragrances sold primarily in the mass retail channels with brands such as COVERGIRL, Max Factor and Rimmel; Coty Luxury, which is focused on prestige fragrances and skincare with brands such as Calvin Klein, Marc Jacobs, Hugo Boss, Gucci and philosophy; and Coty Professional Beauty, which is focused on servicing salon owners and professionals in both hair and nail, with brands such as Wella Professionals, Sebastian Professional, OPI and ghd. Coty has approximately 20,000 colleagues globally and its products are sold in over 130 countries. Coty and its brands are committed to a range of social causes as well as seeking to minimize its impact on the environment.

We are looking for a Director – R&D Consumer Product Development for our R&D site in Versoix, close to Geneva, Switzerland.

Key Responsibilities: 

Reporting to the Senior Director responsible for the development of a portfolio of innovation to serve Coty’s Industry Leading Fragrance Brands (which includes Marc Jacobs, Calvin Klein, Chloe, Gucci, Hugo Boss, Balenciaga Bottega Veneta, Alexander McQueen, Burberry, Joop, Davidoff, and Miu Miu) you will be leading the team responsible for bringing Consumer/Product understanding into all of our innovation programs in Luxury. 

Your team (all of who will be new to Coty) includes Consumer/Product Design experts focussing on Disruptive/Category transformational Innovation, Sustaining Innovation and Digital Product Development and will be based in both Versoix/Geneva and Paris.  In addition you will have coaching responsibility for a member of the Fragrance Design team (Versoix) who will be leading the Consumer/Product development program in that area.  There are a multitude of active projects in all of these areas developing both traditional fragrance forms and new experiences/ways to engage consumers in the Luxury category and adjacent categories.

You will partner extensively with the total luxury R&D team and critically with your Marketing and Consumer Market Insights partners to understand the direction of the business and ensure their engagement, enrolment and sponsorship of the programs owned by your team.  Key partners will also be our Stretch Innovation team (based in Paris) who are responsible for innovation program acceleration, bringing the external innovation ecosystem into Coty Luxury R&D and developing propositions built from this, to launch readiness.

In detail you and your team will be responsible for the following. 

1. Fuelling the current and future innovation plans/strategies with clearly articulated Consumer Product/Experience desires AND the subsequent delivery of brilliantly delightful products and experiences to market readiness in the short, medium and long term via:
   
   
   
   1. Definition of future consumer based luxury innovation opportunity spaces (including Consumer Inspired Digital Product Development) and identification of new consumer category product/experience paradigms and opportunities to break them.
   
   
   2. Creation of innovation lighthouses for each of the core opportunity spaces identified and in partnership with your technical R&D partners, definition of associated development projects to meet short, medium and long term needs of the business.
   
   
   3. Driving the strategic alignment of the focus areas with your business partners and the successful integration of the programs into the business plans across the brands. 
   
   
   4. Ownership and execution of the consumer research programs to develop the products and experiences from inception to launch readiness.
   
   

1.  Continual definition and evolution of consumer research methodology to
   
   
   
   1. Measure consumer response to luxury products/experiences in relevant and innovative ways to uncover new insights/opportunities for competitive advantage.
   
   
   2. Model and predict in market success for developmental projects.
   
   
   3. Experiment with best approaches to pre and in market consumer acceptance testing with a focus on acceleration (fast cycle learning) and productivity.
   
   

You will also have significant responsibility for development of each and every member of your team to their fullest and establishing the culture of your organisation in keeping with the Coty and Luxury R&D values.

There will be some travel to Paris required as part of this role.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE/QUALIFICATIONS/IDEAL FIT

• Scientific or Psychology background – Masters Degree or higher.


• 7-10+ years of experience using consumer insights and/or consumer product understanding to drive the development and launch of multiple business building innovations from Disruptive to Sustaining.


• Demonstrated track record of identifying new consumer based innovation opportunities that change the way consumers experience a category.


• Experience in a wide variety of Qualitative and Quantitative Research approaches including consumer based modelling and awareness of the latest advances in research techniques.


• Sound statistical analysis capabilities.


• Ability to integrate both data and intuition to make decisions and recommendations.


• Track record of leading a team of at least 3 people and developing individuals to their fullest.


• Demonstrated capacity to build and engage teams quickly and effectively and manage stakeholders. (Marketing, Supply Chain, Consumer Market Knowledge etc.)


• Fluency in English, French would be a plus.


• An interest in Fragrances and the Olfactive world is highly advantageous – Curiosity and passion for understanding consumers is a must.


• Innovative thinker, ability to go the extra-mile.