TAPPI Industry Career Center: Michelman Seeks Senior Scientist

The Senior Scientist will join Michelman’s Global Research & Development (R&D) organization for their Printing & Packaging Business Unit (P&P) segment. Informed by important market needs and new trends, you will develop waterborne product prototypes through your ability to connect structure/property fundamentals with novel product functionality. Your mindset for identifying problems and creating solutions will fuel a “reason to believe” for the novel functional benefits to be provided by Michelman materials in a way which will help accelerate the growth of the P&P segment. Excellent problem-solving skills and creativity will be essential to your success as they will allow you to quickly screen new technologies and materials for fit both with the market and with Michelman. Additionally, it will be essential that you develop a strong collaborative network with other groups including sales, technology, marketing, and manufacturing teams to convert those novel concepts into successful product platforms.

Responsibilities & Duties:

• Partner with sales and marketing to develop actionable problem statements based both on trends in the market and on latent customer needs
• Lead in the development of new materials and processes which will enable Michelman to develop novel application-centric solutions for P&P customers
• Design new (and sometimes complex) product development experiments to be conducted at the lab scale – either by you or by others
• Build significant expertise in coatings application methods and performance tests which will enable the development of new product concepts
• Partner with global engineering/manufacturing teams to ensure efficient and effective scale-up of product prototypes of interest to the business/market
• Establish relationships with suppliers, customers/prospects, and industry organizations which allow for sharing Michelman insights to strengthen technical/market leadership positions
• Represent Michelman technologies and solutions at key conferences, as needed
• Develop new product prototypes by iteratively preparing lab scale batches for evaluation and then testing them against market-relevant success criteria/controls
• Develop a basic understanding of chemistries, technologies, and applications of importance to other Michelman business groups to identify potential product translations
• Develop a basic understanding of the regulatory environment as it impacts Michelman raw materials and products and communicate those requirements both internally and externally
• Document thoroughly and accurately all experiments, analyses, and testing results

Please click here to view full list of duties.

Qualifications / Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, Polymer/Materials Science, or related field and at least ten (10) years of relevant experience. Advanced degree preferred.
• Minimum of five years of industrial experience with a proven track record of developing waterborne products, additives, and/or formulations for various applications including corrugation, paper plates, molded fiber, biobased / biodegradable coatings, compostable or recyclable solutions for paper converting and flexible packaging, and other applications in Circular Economy.

Physical / Environmental Demands / Other:

• Able to travel by car or plane to visit customers when needed
• Role may on occasion require long periods of standing and/or an extended work schedule
• Role may require heavy lifting from time to time (as much as 50 lbs. to waist level)
• Role will demand appropriate use of PPE - including safety shoes

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TAPPI
http://www.tappi.org/