Manager, Chef Culinary F&B

This position is on – site in our Royal Caribbean Headquarters 1050

Journey with us! Combine your career goals and sense of adventure by joining our exciting team of employees. Royal Caribbean Group is pleased to offer competitive compensation and benefits package, and excellent career development opportunities, each offering unique ways to explore the world.

The Royal Caribbean Group’s F&B team has an exciting career opportunity for a full Manager, Culinary Development & Operations reporting to Senior Director, Culinary Operations & Excellence.

Position Summary

The Manager, Culinary Development & Operations provides enterprise‑level culinary leadership for onboard dining, ensuring the delivery of innovative, scalable, and operationally sound culinary experiences that align with brand standards, guest expectations, and financial targets. This role leads key aspects of culinary concept development, product standardization, and fleetwide implementation, while developing culinary talent and partnering closely with Operations, Product Development, Procurement, Finance, and Marketing.

A strong focus on continuous improvement is central to the role, including proactively identifying opportunities to enhance or replace existing menu items. The Senior Manager is also responsible for maintaining accurate and complete documentation of product reviews, recipe development and iterations, costing analyses, and photography to ensure disciplined tracking, evaluation, and successful execution of all culinary initiatives.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

Culinary Strategy & Product Development

• Lead the development and evolution of culinary concepts, including island, complimentary, charters and for pay restaurants along with island menus, and recipes aligned with brand positioning, guest experience goals, and operational feasibility from inception to food tastings and approvals.
• Own culinary input for new builds, revitalizations, and enterprise initiatives (e.g., Supper Club, Aqua-Dome and future brand initiatives).
• Guide product ideation, prototyping, testing, validation, and scale-up for limited-time introductions and full fleet launches.
• Provide final culinary recommendations on product readiness, performance, and scalability.

• Oversee F&B initiatives for both on and off premises events, including food preparation and plating for marketing, charity, or run of shows, or attending approved food innovation and equipment shows.

Enterprise Implementation & Governance

• Lead fleet-wide culinary implementation efforts, partnering with shipboard and shoreside leadership to ensure consistent execution of new concepts, menus, and processes.
• Establish and govern culinary development standards, SOPs, and gold-standard benchmarks.
• Oversee recipe documentation, costing integrity, and technical specifications to ensure consistency and compliance across the fleet.
• Serve as culinary subject matter expert for gold standard evaluations, identifying non-conformities and partnering with Procurement and Operations on corrective actions.

Financial Accountability & Continuous Improvement

• Drive culinary decisions that support targeted profitability and influence enterprise food costs across the fleet (>$750M annually).
• Partner with team to assess margin, waste, yield, COS, and labor implications of menu and concept changes.
• Include waste reduction initiatives, data accuracy, and continuous improvement programs that improve efficiency and reduce losses for all new and continuous improvement projects.
• Develop menu strategies to mitigate slow-moving inventory and improve overall product performance.

People Leadership & Capability Building

• Lead, coach, and develop culinary development team members, setting clear performance expectations and development plans.
• Build bench strength and succession pathways for future culinary leaders for shoreside team.
• Foster a culture of accountability, collaboration, innovation, and operational excellence within the culinary development function.

Cross‑Functional & Executive Partnerships

• Partner closely with Product Development, Food & Beverage Op