Director Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory

Director Food Safety, Quality & Regulatory

• Full-time
• Job Duration:
  Regular

Since 1940, Dairy Queen® has been one of the world’s best known and loved brands. Based in Minneapolis, MN, International Dairy Queen Inc., (IDQ), is the parent company of American Dairy Queen Corporation. As a leading franchisor, there are more than 7,000 independently owned and operated restaurants in the U.S., Canada and more than 20 countries around the world. IDQ is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

(Berkshire) which is led by Warren Buffett, the legendary investor and CEO of Berkshire.

Here at IDQ, we create extraordinary Fan experiences every day and we do this through our commitment to hiring and retaining only the best in class talent. We firmly believe that our employees are the catalyst to the success of the company where their initiative, strategic thinking, and entrepreneurial spirit are recognized and rewarded. We're looking for motivated, passionate and dedicated individuals with an inherent need and ambition to go after bigger challenges.

We have an exciting opportunity available for a Director Food, Safety, Quality & Regulatory working hybrid out of our corporate headquarters in Bloomington, MN. This position provides strategic leadership and direction within the Food, Safety, Quality and Regulatory team. While it has a significant number of within‑department responsibilities, it also works with cross‑functional teams to deliver high quality and safe products to restaurants, ensure regulatory compliance, and lead select corporate responsibility initiatives.

Leads and directs strategic development, improvement, implementation, execution, measurement and communication of risk‑based quality and food safety programs, tools and outcomes that are designed to deliver safe and high‑quality food for Dairy Queen business lines. Key areas of responsibility within this accountability include:

• Vendor, product (food, packaging, and chemicals), commissary and warehouse qualification, onboarding, compliance, risk assessment and management
• Specification compliance – tools, measurement, reporting, trends, feedback and continuous improvement
• Issue resolution:
  Proactively and reactively monitor, manage and communicate quality and food safety issues (complaint response, holds, withdrawals, recalls, recovery, crises, guest incidents), including determining root cause analysis
• Food Safety Modernization Act 204 compliance lead for warehouses, suppliers, and DQ restaurants
• Identify trends and apply advanced technical knowledge and skills to solve problems and develop corrective actions for ongoing supplier quality issues related to product manufacturing and quality control.
• Work with Product Development, Legal and Supply Chain to define process parameters and criteria to ensure supplier process capability is effective and compliant to all laws/regulations required
• Technical problem solving
• Partnership with Product Development during development and test phase

• Develop positive cross‑functional (within IDQ) and external relationships (suppliers, government, industry associations, industry leaders) that generate strategic direction, business solutions, create trust, and help develop future department strategies that align with the evolving business.
• Identify situations that warrant communication and promptly and effectively communicate need‑to‑know FSQR items to internal and external stakeholders

• Develop strategies and team & department goals that align with department mission and business goals
• Provide routine coaching and direction to team members to help ensure department and company goals are prioritized and met
• Identify and implement strategies to generate team member satisfaction and productivity
• Elevate team or project issues to department and company leadership as appropriate
• Provide input to and help manage department budget

• Direct team members to or as a contributor, monitor and interpret restaurant regulatory and food safety changes (e.g., Food Code, nutrition, etc.) and…