Director of Product Development

We are looking for a Director of Product Development to assist our team in the creation of new products in Vietnam. The position reports directly to the Senior Director of Product Development, and is responsible for managing the following divisions of Hooker Furnishings NPD:
Hooker Legacy Division- Commerce & Market, Mélange, and Home Office
Hooker Furnishings- Other projects as assigned.
In this role, you will lead an experienced team of NPD administrators to ensure the success of the new product development. You will also communicate directly with our US Merchandizing Department to review new projects and communicate all product development statuses.
POSITION DESCRIPTION:
Tasks include, but are not limited to:
- Leads the product development process effectively and in a timely manner. This includes, but is not limited to, developing samples, reviewing initial costing, negotiating prices based on merchant feedback, ensuring product is manufacturable with factory partners, adhering product to our corporate standards of testing/ compliance, ensuring production references are secured, creating and organizing PPS documentation to ensure hand-off to production is accurate and smooth.
- Enforces corporate timelines, deliverables, and processes. Helps to establish new processes where needed.
- Manages relationships with vendors in order to allocate new development to the correct partners and ensuring capacity.
- Looks for opportunities for continuous improvement in product development, enforces the NPD process established by the corporation.
- Able to communicate difficult concepts in a simple manner to both US Merchants, as well as our factory partners.
- Identifies areas for improvement during sample development, and escalates to proper channels in a responsible, professional, and timely manner. Review samples daily to check for accuracy in following US Merchant's direction.
- Bridges the gap between factory partners and Hooker US merchants. Creates solutions that are a win-win for both parties.
- Ensure all documentation is prepared for Merchant visits.
- Updates weekly NPD tracker to give organizational visibility to management teams.
- Stores data in an organized method and works closely with the Senior Director to provide metrics where needed.