Supply Chain Operations Business Leader (OBL) - Bioprocessing

The Opportunity

We are seeking a highly experienced Senior Manager, Operational Business Lead, Bioprocessing to serve as the critical link between Commercial and Supply Chain while supporting Bioprocessing sales initiatives, strengthening core competencies, and enabling a better experience for customers and the sales team. This leader will help translate customer needs, commercial priorities, and supply chain realities into clear action plans that improve service, remove bottlenecks, and support sustainable growth across the Bioprocessing business.

This role will own support for the Bioprocessing sustainability agenda, business continuity plans, and the continuous improvement of those plans. The successful candidate will also act as the customer-facing voice of our ongoing BCP efforts, helping build confidence with customers and commercial teams through clear communication, disciplined follow-through, and visible progress. The role requires deep Bioprocessing industry experience, strong supply chain judgment, and the ability to influence across commercial, manufacturing, planning, logistics, procurement, quality, regulatory, finance, and regional leadership teams.

Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary operational business lead connecting Commercial and Supply Chain for Bioprocessing priorities, ensuring sales initiatives are supported by clear operating plans, supply chain capability, and end-to-end execution discipline.

• Build and strengthen core competencies across the Bioprocessing organization, including customer supply chain collaboration, BCP readiness, sustainability execution, bottleneck resolution, operational governance, and cross-functional problem solving.

• Partner with commercial leaders and sales teams to understand customer needs, convert market priorities into actionable supply chain requirements, and enable a more reliable and responsive customer experience.

• Own support for the Bioprocessing sustainability agenda by coordinating cross-functional actions, tracking progress, and connecting sustainability priorities to supply chain, operations, customer, and business outcomes.

• Own support for Bioprocessing Business Continuity Plans, including governance, stakeholder engagement, risk visibility, scenario planning, documentation discipline, customer communication readiness, and continuous improvement of BCP maturity.

• Act as the customer-facing voice of continuous BCP efforts, helping customers and sales teams understand how Bioprocessing is strengthening resilience, continuity, service recovery, and long-term supply reliability.

• Identify, escalate, and unlock end-to-end bottlenecks across planning, manufacturing, procurement, logistics, quality, order fulfillment, and customer supply chain processes to improve service and reduce friction for customers and sales teams.

• Translate customer signals, sales priorities, operational data, capacity constraints, and service trends into practical recommendations, aligned action plans, and measurable improvement initiatives.

• Establish and maintain governance routines for priority initiatives, including operating reviews, milestone tracking, issue escalation, risk management, action ownership, and executive-level communication.

• Drive continuous improvement by simplifying processes, improving data quality, reducing manual work, strengthening daily management routines, and embedding sustainable ownership across functions and regions.

• Support major Bioprocessing business priorities, including capability growth, plant or network readiness, supply assurance, customer commitments, sustainability progress, and operational resilience initiatives.

• Develop trusted partnerships across Commercial, Supply Chain, Manufacturing, Planning, Procurement, Logistics, Quality, Regulatory, Finance, Digital, and regional teams to align priorities and accelerate execution.

Qualifications

• 8 to 10 years of experience in supply chain within the Bioprocessing industry is required.

• Direct experience working in or supporting Bioprocessing, life sciences, biologics, biomanufacturing, single-use technologies, filtration, purification, media, buffers, or adjacent bioprocess supply chains is required.

• Proven ability to operate as a link between Commercial and Supply Chain, translating customer and sales needs into operational priorities, capability plans, and supply chain execution.

• Strong understanding of core supply chain and manufacturing processes, including planning, production, procurement, logistics, inventory management, quality, customer service, order fulfillment, and capacity management.

• Demonstrated experience supporting customer-facing supply chain activities, commercial initiatives, customer communication, service recovery, or strategic customer collaboration.

• Experience supporting or leading business continuity planning, risk mitigation, supply assurance, operational resilience, or customer continuity communication processes.

• Strong program and project management capability with demonstrated ability to manage multiple priorities, align stakeholders, mitigate risks, escalate issues, and deliver measurable results.

• Ability to analyze operational data, customer signals, service trends, bottlenecks, and business priorities to create practical recommendations and action plans.

• Excellent communication, executive presence, and stakeholder management skills with the ability to influence across functions, regions, and levels without relying solely on authority.

• Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain, Engineering, Business, Operations Management, Life Sciences, or a related field.

Preferred Experience

• Experience working directly with Bioprocessing customers, commercial teams, or customer-facing supply chain programs.

• Experience supporting sustainability initiatives, supplier/customer sustainability commitments, waste reduction, network optimization, lifecycle management, or operational emissions reduction programs.

• Experience developing, improving, or communicating BCP programs, supply assurance frameworks, recovery plans, risk registers, or customer readiness materials.

• Experience with SAP or other enterprise ERP environments, including planning, order management, master data, business readiness, process improvement, or post-go-live stabilization.

• Experience with operational excellence, Lean Six Sigma, TPM, S&OP, integrated business planning, daily management systems, or structured problem-solving methodologies.

• Experience using Power BI, advanced analytics, workflow automation, AI-enabled decision support, or comparable tools to improve operational visibility and decision making.

• Master's degree in Business, Supply Chain, Engineering, Operations, Life Sciences, or a related field is a plus.

About Ecolab: 

At Ecolab, we prioritize our talent-first philosophy by creating the most capable and diverse team to excel at our nearly three million customer sites. Building on a century of innovation, our 48,000 associates help deliver comprehensive science-based solutions, data-driven insights and world-class service to advance food safety, maintain clean and safe environments, and optimize water and energy use, and improve operational efficiencies and sustainability for customers in the food, healthcare, life sciences, hospitality and industrial markets in more than 170 countries around the world. Our solutions not only enhance operational efficiency but also contribute to sustainability and public health, making a positive impact on the world. We are committed to eliminating unnecessary complexities and embracing a beginner's mindset, continuously seeking new perspectives and innovative solutions to stay ahead in a rapidly changing world. 

Ecolab’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) reflects our longstanding value of working together to integrate diverse perspectives to challenge ourselves, reach our goals and do what’s right. 

Apply today and join one of the most ethical companies with over a hundred years of history. 

Join Ecolab and help us protect what’s vital.  

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