The Sustainable Food Lab is a global network of organizations facilitating market-based change for a sustainable food system. From peer to peer leadership networks and global learning events, to supply chain innovation projects and measurement tools, the Food Lab staff bring organizations together to help them accelerate progress towards a more sustainable food system.

The Lab uses our diverse staff capabilities to:

• Design and facilitate experiential safe-space learning opportunities on tough topics;

• Prototype supply chain sustainability innovations and collaborations, and

• Support the development of organizational strategy and leadership development.

Since 2004, the Sustainable Food Lab has evolved in an eco-system of organizations and associations. The Lab focuses on outcomes and is neutral with respect to specific strategies, standards, or certifications. This agnosticism enables the Lab to bring insights from many different players to innovate a food and beverage supply that supports people, communities and nature.

The Sustainable Food Lab has a job opening. This new hire will be someone who can design and manage projects with companies that source ingredients from large scale commodity agriculture. The Lab is currently working on wheat, corn, potatoes and oats from the United States, Canada and Australia.

The ideal candidate would have practical understanding of agronomy and farming systems as well as familiarity with corporate sustainability programs. She/he would have easy rapport with farmers as well as business decision-makers. We think of this relationship competency as almost multi-lingual because of the cultural uniqueness of different stakeholders as well as different farming regions and companies. The ideal candidate would also be a good facilitator of group conversation and an extraordinary listener in interviews with people. Excellent writing skills would be quite useful. Perhaps even more important are humility, self-awareness and humor.

In addition to working on specific projects, all staff share the mission of the Food Lab to scale sustainable agriculture in the mainstream food system through support of system leaders in multinational corporations, NGOs and donor organizations.

During the Lab’s 13-year history, we have supported the development of sustainable sourcing by many food and beverage companies; we help manage collaborative initiatives of multiple organizations in regions and commodity systems; and we support leadership development and learning platforms. We are passionate about outcomes and agnostic about tools and methods.

The main office of the Sustainable Food Lab is in Hartland, Vermont. Currently all full-time staff work in the office when not traveling. Our team benefits from spontaneous as well as scheduled conversations, and so we prefer that this new position will be filled by someone who might be able to live near enough to the office to be here in person at least occasionally. We are open to compromise on this point if necessary.

We work on a wide variety of projects around the world, and we place a high premium on collegiality and shared learning. We are each entrepreneurial self-starters, and we also support one another when we need to fill in around urgent deliverables. We hold one another mutually responsible for revenue generation so we can balance our budget each year.

The salary for this position will be competitive, and the title dependent upon experience. Benefits include family health plans, a contribution to retirement, and generous vacation time. About 25% travel is expected.