About the role

We are looking for an experienced data consultant to lead projects for our clients in the food service & manufacturing industry. This role will sit within the Professional Services team, reporting to the Head of Professional Services.

Your role will include the following key responsibilities:

Leading Technical Data Projects for Food Companies

We are working with a number of large food companies to help them measure, report and manage their carbon emissions and other environmental impacts, including corporate scope 3 reporting, life cycle assessments of food products and recipes, and development of net-zero strategies and transition plans.

You will lead the delivery of technical data-analysis centric assignments with these clients. This will involve preparing, handling, analysing and drawing insights from their data, to inform key recommendations and shape their strategies. You must be comfortable working with data using scripts, query languages, and a suite of standard and bespoke data analytics packages, techniques and applications.

It will also involve working with our in-house data scientists and engineers to optimise the use of our platform, database and advanced set of bespoke, in-house data tools to deliver for our clients with excellence and efficiency.

Leading on Client Engagement

You will lead strategic engagements with our clients to help them deliver against their ongoing sustainability commitments, rooted in data, and evidence-based research. For many of our clients, this will go beyond compliance, and will require you to provide expert advice and guidance on how the sustainability data we have should inform and align with their broader sustainability goals, objectives and targets.

You will be responsible for managing and strengthening client relationships. You will act as the primary point of contact from initial scoping to final delivery, gaining a deep understanding of their sustainability data, infrastructure and processes, and their wider goals and challenges, and you will work collaboratively with stakeholders to tailor strategic and actionable solutions that align with the clients’ unique objectives, and identifying opportunities for future projects.

Managing and Developing our Team

As a lead consultant, you will be responsible for leading and managing delivery teams on consulting projects, ensuring the successful delivery of technical assignments rooted in data. You will provide strategic direction on projects, oversee project timelines, and allocate resources to meet client objectives, bringing in experts from our science and data teams as required. A key aspect of your role will be developing junior staff, fostering their growth through mentoring, coaching, knowledge sharing, and hands-on training (with a particular focus on data manipulation and analysis techniques). You will create opportunities for them to take on increasing responsibility, while providing constructive feedback and supporting their professional development.

About Foodsteps

Foodsteps is on a mission to empower the food industry to accelerate its journey to net zero. Our specialised food sustainability platform provides instant access to industry-leading data and insights that food services companies and food manufacturers can trust to accurately measure, reduce and report their environmental impact. With Foodsteps, businesses reduce the costs and risks of their net zero transition, and improve sales as a result.

Our Services

Food systems account for nearly a third of global greenhouse gas emissions and are the leading driver of biodiversity loss. In order to avoid the catastrophic consequences from both the climate and ecological crises, we must bring positive change to our food systems—fast.

Foodsteps works with food businesses to measure, reduce, and report their environmental impact. We help our clients calculate product footprints (carbon, land, and water impact); measure and report their corporate GHG emissions; use carbon labels and food stories to educate customers and make robust, evidence-based claims; and define and achieve their sustainability objectives.

The Foodsteps Professional Services team complement our self-service platform and database by offering our clients a wide range of consulting services, including detailed life cycle assessments of food products; hands-on calculations and reporting support for assessments including CSRD, SECR and SBTi; and developing sustainability strategies to help them progress towards net zero.

Must haves

• 10+ years of experience working in a consulting environment

• Experience leading consulting projects, delivering evidence based insights and actionable recommendations on strategic direction and implementation roadmaps, informed by technical analysis of data

• Experience conducting and leading insightful analysis of large datasets, and working with programming languages such as Python, R or SQL

• Experience working alongside data scientists and software engineers to develop new/improved tools

• The ability to lead client-facing projects independently, including managing relationships with and presenting to senior client stakeholders

• Experience with picking up new concepts, methodologies and tools quickly in a fast-paced environment

• Experience coordinating and leading multi-disciplinary delivery teams

• Experience leading a team of junior staff, and contributing to their continuous professional development through mentorship or coaching

• Highly motivated, able to take initiative and be efficient in performing tasks with an eye for detail in the data

• Passion for the Foodsteps’ mission, working with data, the food industry and a drive for sustainability

• Great communication skills

Nice to haves

• Experience conducting carbon reporting assessments for corporate clients to GHG Protocol standard,

• Familiarity with wider existing and upcoming sustainability standards, such as SBTi (including FLAG), CSRD

• Experience in and a knowledge of the food sector, and associated supply chains

• Line management experience

Salary, Location and Benefits

• £65,000-80,000 salary, and participation in Company Bonus Scheme

• Full range of benefits that Foodsteps offers including 27 paid holiday days, flexible working, volunteering days, and climate perks travel days.

• Welcoming office in Whitechapel, London with a variety of working spaces.

• Based in the UK, in the office at least quarterly for team days, with some flexibility around heading into our office for other workshops and meetings.

• Additionally, flexibility to attend client meetings, likely to be in/around the London area approximately monthly, although frequency is project dependent.