Director of Innovation Strategy & Execution

Traditional Medicinals is the leading medicinal tea company in the U.S., with a 50‑year legacy of advancing the health of people and the planet through the power of plants. Rooted in herbal wisdom and grounded in modern science, we are committed to ethical sourcing, quality, and sustainability. As consumer interest in herbal medicine continues to grow, we are focused on building a disciplined innovation capability that sustains the core business while creating the future. **The Role** Reporting to the Chief Science Officer, the Director of Innovation Strategy & Execution is a senior leadership role responsible for shaping, leading, and delivering Traditional Medicinals’ innovation agenda across formats and time horizons. This role ensures innovation at TM is: - Strategically grounded in clear choices about where to play and how to win - Consumer-led, rooted in real needs and jobs-to-be-done - Commercially viable, with credible paths to value creation - Operationally executable, aligned with TM’s capabilities and constraints The Director of Innovation Strategy & Execution leads the front end of innovation (Discovery / Gate 0) and owns the innovation pipeline and ways of working from opportunity identification through early commercialization handoff. They partner deeply with Brand, R&D, Sales, Supply Chain, Finance, and external partners to turn ideas into businesses worth investing in and ensures innovation contributes meaningfully to both near-term performance and long-term portfolio evolution. This role requires both strategic leadership and hands-on execution. The Director must be comfortable defining innovation direction while personally driving Discovery workstreams, developing briefs, and advancing initiatives through ambiguity. Traditional Medicinals operates with focus and discipline rather than excess. This role is best suited for a leader who enjoys building systems and capabilities in environments where clarity must be created, not inherited. The Director must be comfortable advancing work through influence, experimentation, and thoughtful trade-offs rather than relying on large teams or budgets. **Key Responsibilities** **1. Innovation Strategy Leadership and Portfolio of Innovation Management** - Lead the development and ongoing evolution of TM’s innovation strategy, aligned with business priorities, brand strategy, and purpose. - Build and actively manage a balanced innovation portfolio across horizons (near‑term, mid‑term, longer‑term), with explicit prioritization and trade‑offs. - Own a 3‑year innovation roadmap and a longer‑range (5–7 year) opportunity view, focused on where TM can credibly play and win beyond the core. - Define TM’s innovation risk posture, clarifying what types of bets warrant exploration, piloting, or scale. - Identify innovation opportunities that drive incremental growth, differentiation, and long‑term relevance, aligned with TM’s purpose and sourcing and quality standards. **2. End‑to‑End Ownership of Discovery (Gate 0)** - Own the Discovery process end‑to‑end, from idea intake through readiness for prioritization and investment. - Translate consumer needs, market trends, and cultural shifts into clear opportunity spaces and innovation briefs aligned with the strategy. - Ensure each initiative is supported by a credible business case, including consumer value, financial logic, and operational feasibility. - Orchestrate Desirability, Viability, and Feasibility (DVF) work across Brand, Consumer Insights, R&D, Supply Chain, Sales, Finance, PMO, and outside partners. - Surface and resolve trade‑offs across DVF dimensions to support clear decision‑making. - Champion a test-and-learn mindset, using evidence, not opinion, to guide decisions. Utilize Design Thinking, Lean Start up, and Agile principles to ensure that maximum learning is completed with minimal resources and time by focusing on highest risk hypothesis first rather than a traditional sequence of activities in Discovery. - Partner…