Senior Product Developer CD&D Pet Nutrition - Harvard, IL

Job Description

Senior Product Developer CD&D Pet Nutrition - Harvard, IL

MAIN FUNCTION: We are seeking a hands-on Product Developer to support innovation, formulation, scale-up, and continuous improvement of pet food, treat, and supplement products across multiple species and technologies. This role requires the ability to characterize new and existing ingredients to identify optimal solutions for formulation challenges, while applying practical manufacturing knowledge to ensure products perform reliably at commercial scale. A working understanding of pet food, treat, and supplement manufacturing processes is required. The successful candidate will demonstrate experience in formulation methodologies and ingredient functionality, along with the ability to create high-quality products suitable for customer evaluation and commercial production. This individual will bring strong manufacturing experience in pet food production, practical process knowledge, and a solid understanding of the pet market. The role will serve as a bridge between Operations, Quality, Commercial, and R&D—translating real-world plant performance into improved product design and more robust formulations. The selected individual will evaluate ingredients, adjust formulations, troubleshoot manufacturing issues, and contribute to the development of new and existing products for dogs, cats, birds, rodents, and horses.

DESCRIPTION OF WORK PERFORMED:

• Accountable for developing formulations for pet treats and pet supplements while fully leveraging the ADM portfolio.
• Accountable for driving ingredient selection and delivering technical solutions across diverse product formats, ensuring outcomes meet client needs and align with ADM’s innovation and quality standards.
• Accountable for partnering with Quality, Operations, Regulatory, and Procurement to integrate cross-functional insights into product development, ensuring alignment with ADM’s standards and successful project outcomes.
• Accountable for scaling up product prototypes through the commercialization phase.
• Accountable for independently designing and executing experiments.
• Responsible for leading complex projects that require coordination across ADM’s functional matrix.
• Responsible for developing and maintaining strong relationships with customers.
• Responsible for supporting ADM growth strategy initiatives.
• Responsible for supporting manufacturing plants with troubleshooting activities and industrial trials.
• Demonstrates self-motivation to challenge the status quo and advance CD&D efforts through innovative solutions.
• Stays at the forefront of industry advancements by integrating new ingredients, processing methods, and technologies into ADM’s development practices to strengthen competitiveness and product impact.

• Sense of urgency, acceptance of change, communication, technical knowledge, quality minded, collaboration, flexibility, teamwork, problem solving, dependability, process-driven problem solving, curiosity, integrity and a commitment to safety.

KEY SKILLS & COMPETENCIES:

• Associate degree in a technical, food, or related field or a minimum of 7-10 years of hands-on experience in a pet food manufacturing environment, with exposure to production, quality, R&D or process roles.
• Manufacturing & Process Experience – Demonstrated hands-on experience in pet food manufacturing, with particular familiarity with extrusion and bakery technologies, including an understanding of production workflows, equipment capabilities, and process constraints. Able to apply this knowledge to support product development, troubleshooting, and successful scale-up from pilot to commercial production.
• Scientific Skills – The individual is comfortable with common scientific terminology, basic chemistry terms and concepts, basic animal physiology, along with intermediate Chemistry and Biology knowledge including chemical elements, compounds, reactions and terminology.
• Food Science Skills – The individual is comfortable with basic food science principles, including knowledge of food chemistry, lipids, carbohydrates, proteins and the principles of food processing.
• Project Management Skills – The individual is capable of planning, organizing and managing the efforts to accomplish a successful project; a project is a one-time activity that produces a specific output.
• Industry Knowledge – The individual has basic knowledge of pet food industry including key companies, technologies, cost and geographical factors. Appropriate understanding of consumer drivers.
• Bench Development Aptitude – Understanding of food manufacturing equipment operating procedures and desire to perfor