Job Description

NXT Upper Systems Team Opportunity

The mission of the Upper Systems Team in NXT Footwear is to elevate our product experience by pushing the edges of materials solutions that unlock the potential of all our athletes. We are inspired by our heritage and continually innovate around how materials can revolutionize our performance and lifestyle products while concurrently reducing Nike's environmental impact. We are a high performance team that works collaboratively, pushes the boundaries, and always stays focused on delivering the best solutions for the athlete.

You will partner with the rest of the NXT Upper Systems team, and cross functional experts within innovation and across Nike including NXT Product Design and Materials Design, NXT Future Product Development and Engineering, NXT Future Capabilities, Research and Testing labs, Legal and downstream partners of the same to deliver solutions for sustainable, performance and or expression upper systems materials technologies.

As a Material expert, you will work with external material vendors, equipment suppliers, raw material suppliers, yarn suppliers and manufacturers, and footwear product innovation centers to create solutions that meet all required footwear performance and sustainability specifications.

You will collaborate with other technical experts, participate in ideation sessions, collaborate with suppliers and manufacturing partners, and more; the daily responsibilities of this role are wide ranging, challenging, and rewarding.

This role does not have direct reports.

Who We Are Looking For

We're looking for an exceptional Materials Innovator who provides technical expertise within the areas of footwear material innovation and development. This person will ideally bring experience in innovating and developing textiles, nonwovens, leathers, synthetic leathers, films, and footwear components. Knowledge and understanding of fiber processing, polymer chemistry, and various extrusion and coating/printing methods are a bonus. Additionally, a background in application of these yarns, coatings, rolled goods and engineered materials onto a variety of footwear products to fulfill performance, expression and sustainability goals will be key to role. The material solutions this teammate creates will fuel new product concepts and support strategic development efforts within Nike innovation.

The Lead Materials Innovator will have experience working with external material vendors to create innovation within the upper materials and construction for a variety of footwear products. This person will have a history of partnering with external suppliers to translate material and product design direction and performance needs into technical and footwear applicable solutions. The Lead Material Innovator will have a strong understanding of current day commercialized material technologies for footwear across all material types, and have a keen curiosity on how those technologies can be pushed in new directions through collaborative partnership with outside material suppliers.

The ideal candidate needs to be a strategic thinker, collaborator and highly innovative problem solver who can work independently or cross-functionally with a diverse set of teams across Nike to fuel and support new material and product concepts and strategic development efforts within Nike Footwear Innovation.

• Bachelor's degree in Fiber and Textile Science, Materials Science, Engineering, Materials or Product Development disciplines or a related field. Will accept any suitable combination of education, experience and training.
• Minimum 5 years of relevant work experience in Footwear Upper Material Development with application across various product types and fields of play being ideal.
• Knowledge of footwear material types including fibers, yarns, textiles, leathers, synthetic leathers, films, and components or trims; Understanding of their manufacturing processes, levers to be manipulated for creating change, and best ways to apply and validate their application within footwear
• Critical intimate knowledge of Nike Material Vendors and their material offerings for efficient decision making when materializing product for performance, aesthetic, and/or sustainability
• Ability to ideate and create innovative material and product concepts, and manage their transition to commercial scale
• Experience in materials testing, characterization, and data analytics.
• Solid understanding and knowledge of the footwear product creation process
• Ability to clearly articulate project goals and objectives to relevant audiences.
• Experience working and communicating directly with internal and external partners at the global level
• Self motivated, able to execute in an ambiguous environment, and drive projects forward in pursuit of data driven decision making
• Ability to work with a moderate guidance and effectively keep senior management informed of both progress and challenges.
• Attention to detail, active follow-through, assertiveness, self-motivation
• Strong interpersonal and collaboration skills
• Ability to foster a culture that supports and encourages diversity, equity and inclusion.
• Passion for Nike brand, sport and innovation.
• Flexibility to approximately travel 5-10% of the calendar year

What You Will Work On

If this is you, you'll be working on a wide range of material and footwear projects that span ideation to commercialization, including solving complex problems for all types of materials and footwear applications. You will be focused on driving material innovation and readiness with a sharp focus on execution of material creation, sourcing, cost, quality, and implementation of sustainable solutions. You will partner closely with material vendors and footwear innovation centers to elevate existing material creation technologies into new directions, or utilize existing material constructions in new ways or methods of make to provide new aesthetic or performance benefits. Additionally, exploring new ways of testing and validating new or existing materials to provide athlete benefits through materials and construction are a benefit of this role. You will be responsible for providing updates to inform stakeholders and development partners about the innovation projects you are covering.

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