Materials Development

Title: Materials Development 3

Location: Beaverton, OR

Duration: 6 months contract

NIKE, Inc. does more than outfit the world's best athletes. It is a place to explore potential, obliterate boundaries and push out the edges of what can be. The company looks for people who can grow, think, dream and create. Its culture thrives by embracing diversity and rewarding imagination. The brand seeks achievers, leaders and visionaries. At Nike, it’s about each person bringing skills and passion to a challenging and constantly evolving game.

The position is responsible for managing new yarn development initiatives, supporting yarn onboarding and divestment activities, maintaining visibility to yarn supply and operational risks, and coordinating with suppliers to ensure material readiness aligns with product creation and commercialization timelines. The role also partners closely with Materials Sourcing and Materials Planning teams to support supply planning, capacity management, inventory health, and supplier readiness across the Flyknit material portfolio.

Without temporary backfill support, the organization faces increased risk of delays in yarn development projects, reduced visibility to supply chain constraints, disruptions to onboarding and phase-out activities, slower supplier issue resolution, and potential impacts to seasonal commercialization timelines. In addition, these responsibilities cannot be readily absorbed by the existing team without creating workload constraints and increasing operational risk across multiple cross-functional partners.

A temporary contractor will ensure continuity of critical business processes, maintain supplier relationships, support material planning and sourcing activities, identify and mitigate supply risks, and enable uninterrupted execution of Flyknit material development and commercialization objectives during the leave period.

Yarn Development & Material Expertise

• Understanding of yarn development and commercialization processes.
• Knowledge of yarn specifications, performance requirements, and manufacturing implications.
• Experience supporting material qualification, onboarding, and lifecycle management.

Supply Chain & Material Planning

• Understanding of material supply chains and supplier networks.
• Experience with material onboarding and divestment processes.
• Ability to identify and mitigate supply, capacity, and inventory risks.
• Knowledge of seasonal planning and material readiness processes.

Sourcing & Vendor Management

• Experience working with global suppliers and manufacturing partners.
• Strong supplier relationship management and communication skills.
• Ability to support sourcing decisions, supplier capability reviews, and issue resolution.
• Understanding of supplier capacity, lead times, and risk management.

Operations & Systems

• Experience managing material or yarn-related data and systems.
• Strong analytical and organizational skills.
• Ability to maintain accurate material specifications, tracking, and reporting.
• Advanced Excel and data management capabilities.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

Proven ability to work across:

• Materials Development
• Materials Sourcing
• Materials Planning
• Product Development
• Manufacturing Operations
• External Vendors and Suppliers

Core Competencies

• Project management
• Risk identification and mitigation
• Stakeholder management
• Supply chain awareness
• Strong communication and influencing skills
• Ability to work independently and manage multiple priorities

Preferred Experience

• Footwear, textile, yarn, or materials development experience.
• Knowledge of Nike product creation and commercialization processes.
• Experience supporting innovation-to-scale transitions and supplier readiness activities.