Director of Research and Development – Portfolio Management

Location: Montvale

Department:
Research

Location:

MONTVALEPosted: COMPANY OVERVIEW:

Balchem is committed to making the world a healthier place by delivering trusted, innovative, and science-based solutions for the health and nutritional needs of the world. Balchem employs approximately 1,400 employees worldwide who provide the service, quality, and technology that enables our customers to win with their customers. We have built a reputation for delivering results to all of our stakeholders.

Founded in 1967, Balchem, a Maryland corporation, became a publicly-traded company in 1970 and is listed on Nasdaq under the symbol “BCPC.” Our corporate headquarters is located in Montvale, New Jersey, and we have a broad network of sales offices, manufacturing sites, and R&D centers, primarily located in the U.S. and Europe. The Company consists of three business segments:
Human Nutrition and Health, Animal Nutrition and Health, and Specialty Products.

POSITION SUMMARY:

The Director of Research & Development – Portfolio Management serves as the R&D leader responsible for portfolio visibility, prioritization, stage-gate process effectiveness, and execution discipline across the Human Nutrition & Health (HNH) business.

This role is accountable for ensuring that R&D programs, including market-driven innovation, customer-driven new product development (NPD), and support projects, are clearly defined, properly prioritized, and effectively executed. The Director leads a team of project managers and provides structure and coordination across Food Solutions, Minerals & Nutrients, and Technical Operations teams and operates with visibility to related R&D activities across other business segments supporting alignment where appropriate.

The Director partners closely with R&D and cross-functional leadership to ensure alignment between project objectives, timelines, resource capacity, and business priorities, while leading portfolio governance, reporting, and metrics. This role also serves as a key interface with Finance and other functions to align R&D activities with business performance and planning.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS:

Accountable for the safety of all R&D personnel and activities within scope, promoting a culture of zero injuries.

Ensure all R&D activities comply with regulatory, quality, and corporate standards.

Serves as the R&D leader for portfolio management, execution discipline, and reporting across HNH.Leads the development, maintenance, and visibility of the R&D project portfolio across all HNH business units.

Partners with Food Solutions, M&N, and Technical Operations leadership to align on project prioritization, sequencing, and trade-off decisions.

Ensures that projects are clearly defined with scope, objectives, timelines, and success criteria, and that prioritization decisions are supported by structured data, defined evaluation criteria, and alignment to portfolio balance and resource capacity.

Ensures appropriate portfolio balance across market-driven NPD, customer-driven NPD, and support projects, aligned to defined frameworks and available resources.

Maintains visibility to resource allocation, capacity, and execution risks to support realistic planning and delivery

Leads a team of project managers responsible for major R&D programs across HNH.Establishes, leads, and continuously improves project management standards, tools, stage-gate governance, and ways of working, ensuring consistent execution across market-driven, customer-driven, and support project processes.

Leads, maintains, and continuously improves the HNH R&D stage-gate processes and systems, ensuring adoption, execution discipline, and alignment to business and portfolio needs.

Drives cross-functional accountability for project progress, timelines,…