Manager European Lab Services- Ireland (Clara) and Netherlands (Venray)
Role Overview:
The Senior Manager for European Lab Services is responsible for strengthening Nelipak’s laboratory capabilities. For both Clara and Venray. This includes managing laboratory health & safety, customer relationship management, business development, collaboration with external laboratories, budgetary management, standardizing method development, documentation systems, acquisition of new laboratory instrumentation, and daily planning of validation activities. An important task is achieving the ISO 17025 accreditation for the Venray validation lab whilst maintaining this accreditation for Clara lab.
Key Responsibilities:
Leadership & People Management
§ Review and approve test reports and test plans prepared by validation engineers/employees.
§ Organize daily planning of validation activities and schedule customer projects in advance.
§ Identify gaps in validation capacity and propose improvements.
§ Guide junior validation engineers/employees and support their development.
§ Identify training needs and provide continuous feedback to the department manager.
§ Lead the team in resource planning, performance management, and personnel development.
§ Recognize and stimulate opportunities for business development within validation.
§ Ensuring the laboratories have robust planning, preparation and execution for internal and external audits
Technical Responsibilities
§ Provide analytical support to production for resolving claims or production issues.
§ Independently develop test protocols and apply known methods/techniques to solve problems.
§ Perform chemical and polymer analyses to understand raw materials and competing products.
§ Improve methods and reproducibility through statistical analysis.
§ Contribute to writing and reviewing quality documentation.
Customer Relations & Business Development
§ Organize and conduct customer visits.
§ Prepare quotations based on customer requests.
§ Support the marketing department in promoting validation services.
§ Attend trade fairs and strategically present the lab’s validation capabilities.
§ Understand instrumentation limitations and align with customer needs and precision requirements.
§ Writing and substantiating business cases, investments in equipment must be presented and justifies from a business perspective.
Continuous Improvement
§ Collaborate with product development teams on analysis and new product development.
§ Strengthen lab validation capacity by documenting proposals (scope, plan, costs, relevance).
§ Evaluate and purchase new validation instrumentation.
§ Develop new methods through literature research, practical experimentation, and statistical validation.
Essential Criteria:
§ Degree in Materials Science, Engineering, Chemistry, or similar, with relevant experience.
§ Strong knowledge of ISO 17025, ISO 11607, validation standards, and statistical tools (e.g., Gage R&R).
§ Leadership experience, ideally across multiple sites.
§ Excellent communication, project management, and customer-focused mindset.
§ Experience with polymers, packaging materials, and SAP is an advantage.
Interested?
Please e-mail your CV and expression of interest to [email protected] 5pm, Wednesday 17th June 2026.
Benefits:
- Bike to work scheme
- Company pension
- On-site parking
- Private medical insurance
- Sick pay
- Wellness program
Work Location: In person
