The posting
This role is for one of Weekday’s clients Salary range: Rs 3000000 - Rs 6000000 (ie INR 30 - 60 LPA)
Min Experience: 10+ years Location: Hyderabad JobType: full-time
We are looking for an experienced Head of Quality and Compliance to lead food quality assurance, food safety, and regulatory compliance across manufacturing facilities, warehouses, retail outlets, and online distribution channels.
The role will establish and maintain consistent quality standards across the business, ensuring compliance with FSSAI regulations and relevant international food safety standards. The individual will be responsible for protecting consumer safety, maintaining product consistency, ensuring audit readiness, and supporting business expansion and export operations.
Function: Quality Assurance, Food Safety & Regulatory Compliance Reporting To: Vice President – Operations, with direct access to the Managing Director / CEO for critical food safety and regulatory matters Location: Hyderabad (Central Production Unit), with travel to stores, production sites, warehouses, suppliers, contract manufacturers, and logistics partners Experience: 12–15 years, including at least 5 years leading quality across multiple production sites or a retail chain Team: Production QA Executives, Store Hygiene Auditors, Laboratory, Documentation, and Regulatory Staff
Requirements
Key Responsibilities
1. Food Safety Management System & Quality Assurance
- Establish, implement, and maintain the Food Safety Management System (FSMS) across production units, warehouses, and retail outlets.
- Lead the implementation and certification of ISO 22000, FSSC 22000, BRCGS, SQF, and other relevant GFSI-benchmarked standards.
- Oversee HACCP, GMP, GHP, prerequisite programmes, SOPs, documentation, and change-control processes.
- Lead internal audits, management reviews, and certification and surveillance audits.
- Conduct regular quality reviews, identify non-conformities, and drive root-cause analysis and corrective and preventive actions (CAPA).
- Manage in-house laboratory operations and testing programmes through NABL-accredited laboratories.
- Ensure appropriate testing of raw materials, packaging, and finished products for microbiological, chemical, and adulteration risks.
- Maintain accurate quality records and implement digital audit, documentation, and traceability systems.
2. FSSAI Licensing, Regulatory Compliance & Inspections
- Ensure all production units, stores, and warehouses maintain valid FSSAI licences and registrations.
- Maintain a compliance register covering licence scope, renewals, conditions, display requirements, and location-specific permissions.
- Ensure compliance with the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, and applicable FSSAI regulations, including labelling, additives, permitted colours, contaminant limits, and display requirements for loose sweets.
- Lead preparations for FSSAI audits, food safety inspections, and official product sampling.
- Coordinate with regulatory authorities and ensure accurate documentation and timely responses to inspection observations and show-cause notices.
- Assign corrective actions, monitor closure timelines, and verify the effectiveness of implemented measures.
- Maintain audit-ready records covering testing, traceability, sanitation, pest control, training, and product disposition.
3. Labelling, Packaging & Legal Metrology
- Review and approve product labels, packaging artwork, and online product listings before launch.
- Ensure mandatory declarations covering ingredients, allergens, nutrition, dates, and other regulatory requirements are accurate.
- Ensure Legal Metrology compliance for packaged products, including net quantity, MRP declarations, registrations, and weighing equipment.
- Review product and marketing claims for regulatory compliance.
- Coordinate Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and plastic waste compliance with relevant internal teams.
4. Raw Material & Supplier Quality Management
- Establish quality specifications for milk, khoa, paneer, ghee, sugar, flour, edible oils, dry fruits, nuts, spices, additives, colours, flavours, and other ingredients.
- Approve, audit, assess, and monitor suppliers through risk assessments, documentation, and performance reviews.
- Establish controls for adulteration and contamination risks, including aflatoxins, synthetic colours, rancid oils, residues, pests, and foreign matter.
- Define incoming material inspection and acceptance criteria, including vehicle hygiene, temperature, packaging condition, batch identity, shelf life, and Certificates of Analysis.
- Implement quarantine, sampling, acceptance, and rejection procedures.
- Investigate supplier quality failures and ensure corrective actions are implemented effectively.
5. Production & Product Quality Control
- Define product specifications, process checkpoints, sampling plans, test methods, and acceptance criteria across all product categories.
- Establish critical controls for cooking, cooling, frying, holding, packaging, and storage, particularly for high-risk milk-based sweets.
- Monitor frying-oil quality through Total Polar Compounds (TPC) testing and establish appropriate oil disposal and reuse controls.
- Oversee incoming, in-process, and finished-product inspections, including taste, texture, appearance, weight, packaging integrity, and safety parameters.
- Maintain consistency in recipes and product quality across batches and production units.
- Implement allergen management, foreign-body prevention, cross-contamination controls, and validated cleaning procedures.
- Oversee sanitation, pest control, personal hygiene, and environmental monitoring.
- Conduct shelf-life studies and approve product shelf-life standards based on seasonality and storage conditions.
- Ensure proper control of rework, work-in-progress, intermediate stock, and finished-goods release.
- Coordinate calibration and maintenance of quality testing instruments.
6. Retail Stores & Customer Experience
- Establish quality and hygiene standards for receiving, storage, display, serving, replenishment, cleaning, and product withdrawal at retail outlets.
- Enforce FIFO rotation, batch identification, best-before labelling, and defined display-life standards.
- Conduct planned and unannounced store hygiene inspections and ensure timely closure of findings.
- Monitor refrigeration, display temperatures, utensil sanitation, personal hygiene, pest control, allergen communication, and ready-to-eat food protection.
- Ensure every store has a FoSTaC-trained Food Safety Supervisor.
- Establish procedures for withdrawing, segregating, and disposing of unsaleable or non-conforming products.
7. Online Channels, Contract Manufacturing & Distribution
- Define quality and shelf-life-at-delivery standards for e-commerce, quick commerce, modern trade, corporate orders, and gifting channels.
- Audit fulfilment partners, distributor warehouses, contract manufacturers, and co-packers.
- Establish and monitor product-specific chilled, frozen, and ambient storage and transportation standards.
- Oversee temperature mapping and qualification of cold rooms, freezers, refrigerated vehicles, and display equipment.
- Implement calibrated temperature monitoring, data loggers, alarm limits, and documented dispatch and receipt checks.
- Assess temperature excursions and approve product hold, release, rejection, or disposal decisions based on risk.
- Ensure transport hygiene and prevent uncontrolled thawing and refreezing.
8. Import & Export Quality Compliance
- Ensure imported ingredients and packaging comply with applicable FSSAI import clearance requirements.
- Assess destination-market regulations and customer requirements before approving export products, ingredients, labels, and packaging.
- Coordinate product testing, quality certificates, registrations, and export documentation.
- Validate shelf life and packaging against transit duration and destination storage conditions.
- Approve export specifications and shipment release checklists.
- Support overseas customer audits, importer queries, and complaint investigations.
- Maintain market-specific product documentation and recall coordination procedures.
9. Complaints, Traceability & Product Recalls
- Maintain end-to-end batch traceability from raw material intake to final retail or online sale.
- Conduct mock recalls at least twice a year across sites and distribution channels.
- Investigate customer complaints and product quality concerns in collaboration with Production and Retail teams.
- Own the product recall plan and lead product withdrawals or recalls in coordination with the crisis management team.
- Ensure timely communication, investigation, corrective action, and documentation of quality incidents.
10. Utilities Quality & Compliance
- Oversee quality and compliance monitoring of Effluent Treatment Plants (ETP), Sewage Treatment Plants (STP), Water Treatment Plants (WTP), and Reverse Osmosis (RO) systems in coordination with Engineering and EHS.
- Define sampling and testing schedules for wastewater and treated water, including relevant parameters such as pH, BOD, COD, and suspended solids.
- Ensure water used in food production and on food-contact surfaces meets applicable potable water standards.
- Monitor filtration, disinfection, RO treatment, tank hygiene, water distribution, and sanitisation records.
- Review laboratory reports, operating logs, and corrective actions for out-of-limit results.
- Establish procedures for water-quality failures, including isolation, alternate-water arrangements, product risk assessment, and approval before resuming use.
- Coordinate corrective actions for utility-related risks and verify their effectiveness.
11. Team Leadership & Quality Culture
- Build, lead, and develop a capable QA team across production facilities and retail outlets.
- Define team responsibilities, site coverage, succession plans, and escalation processes.
- Conduct food safety and hygiene training for production, store, logistics, and food-handling teams.
- Build a culture of accountability where food safety and hygiene are everyone's responsibility.
- Collaborate with Production, Retail, Procurement, Supply Chain, Engineering, EHS, Marketing, HR, and Product Development.
- Present monthly quality dashboards and performance updates to the Vice President – Operations.
- Manage the QA budget, including laboratory testing, certifications, audits, and pest control contracts.
Decision-Making Authority
- Hold or reject non-conforming raw materials, packaging, intermediate stock, and finished products.
- Stop affected production, dispatch, or sales activities whenever food safety is at risk.
- Block the release of non-compliant labels, product listings, or marketing claims.
- Approve product quality disposition and restart or release only after satisfactory verification.
- Recommend supplier or contract manufacturer suspension and process or packaging changes based on documented risks.
Must-Have Skills & Qualifications
- 12–15 years of experience in food quality assurance, quality control, food safety, and regulatory compliance.
- At least 5 years of experience leading quality operations across multiple production sites or a retail chain.
- Bachelor's or Master's degree in Food Technology, Food Science, Dairy Technology, Microbiology, or a related discipline.
- Hands-on experience in Indian sweets, namkeen, dairy, bakery, chocolates, QSR, or food retail, covering manufacturing and multi-location retail operations.
- Proven experience leading ISO 22000 / FSSC 22000 and BRCGS / SQF certification audits.
- Strong working knowledge of the FSS Act, 2006, FSSAI regulations, food licensing, labelling, sweet-shop display requirements, and contaminant limits.
- Working knowledge of Legal Metrology requirements.
- Direct experience managing FSSAI audits, regulatory inspections, responses to observations, and corrective-action closure.
- Experience in export quality compliance, chilled and frozen cold-chain management, and contract manufacturer quality oversight.
- Experience overseeing ETP/STP and WTP/RO quality monitoring in coordination with Engineering and EHS.
- Lead Auditor certification in ISO 22000 / FSSC 22000 and HACCP Level 3 or above.
Good-to-Have Skills
- Experience managing quality and food safety for milk-based sweets and associated microbiological risks.
- Experience implementing hygiene programmes across a chain of 10 or more retail outlets.
- FoSTaC Trainer Certification or FSSAI Hygiene Rating auditor experience.
- BRCGS or SQF practitioner qualification.
- Experience with e-commerce food packaging and shelf-life management.
- Working knowledge of Telugu or Hindi for training production and store teams.
Key Performance Indicators
- Certification achieved as planned, with zero major non-conformities during audits.
- Zero FSSAI notices, failed official samples, or lapsed licences.
- Average store hygiene audit score of at least 90%.
- Excellent (5-smiley) FSSAI Hygiene Rating for all eligible stores.
- Fewer than one consumer complaint per 10,000 bills.
- At least 98% of laboratory samples within specification.
- At least 95% of internal audit non-conformities closed on time.
- 100% of lots traced within four hours during mock recalls.
- 100% completion of food safety training for production and store staff.
- Reduction in repeat supplier failures and partner audit findings.
- Timely assessment and disposition of cold-chain excursions and water-quality failures.
Key Stakeholders & Working Conditions
Internal Stakeholders: Management, Production, Procurement, Retail Operations, Supply Chain, Logistics, Engineering, EHS, Marketing, Product Development, HR, and Customer Service.
External Stakeholders: FSSAI and state food safety authorities, Legal Metrology officials, certification bodies, NABL-accredited laboratories, raw material and packaging suppliers, contract manufacturers, logistics and fulfilment partners, pest control agencies, and corporate, e-commerce, and export customers.
Working Conditions:
- Based at the Hyderabad central production unit, with regular time spent on the production floor.
- Frequent planned and unannounced visits to retail stores and other operational sites.
- Extended working hours may be required during festive and peak business periods, including Diwali, Sankranti, Rakhi, and the wedding season.
