Moving from Hygiene Manager to Technical Manager

Hi, 

I am currently working as a hygiene manager with a food manufacturer and previously worked as a food safety manager in catering. The reason I moved from food safety is to gain BRC knowledge and experience.

Now, I am trying to move back into a position in technical (Quality/Technical Manager) and could someone actually give advice on how this will work? I applied for so many food safety/quality/technical roles but never had any feedback and receiving phone calls for plenty of hygiene manager roles. 

Has anyone had experience like me before? Any help would be appreciated. 

Thanks

S

Hi Salakidum,

I beleive this is possible as long as you plan to have some quality related courses, HACCP and other food safety trainings. As you already had some previous experience, you just need to steer your career towards quality. you may not get manager posts directly initially, but i don't see why you will not any calls as food safety manager or at least quality assistant to start with with quick progressions.

good luck

Obviously it's all a bit speculative as we don't know your CV or the roles you're going for, but..

Are you applying for roles in industry areas in which you already have experience?
To move into a technical manager role, I'd expect recruiters will want to see either experience at a more junior level in the same industry sector and a demonstration of progression, or actual experience as a technical manager even if not necessarily in directly the same industry area. Of course, if they get applicants with managerial experience and product/process experience then these will generally be the ones they focus on.

Views will of course vary between different companies, and in general I've found that smaller business are (perhaps unsurprisingly) a bit more flexible on such things.

Are you applying through recruitment agents?
If so, it is worth asking them for feedback as they should know their clients well (although appreciate this is an optimistic sentiment based on experience with many recruitment agents both as a candidate and a client ;) ) - it could be that they are finding that there are already lots of candidates with QA/Tech manager experience or at least more direct QA-type backgrounds, so frustrating though it may be, getting some time in a more junior QA role onto your CV could be necessary.

Your CV structure/content could also have a bearing - I'm sure you've already considered as much, but make sure this emphasises the direct experience of the relevant aspects for the tech/QA manager roles, and also the key aspects from the hygiene and food service areas that are directly beneficial for this type of role.

Also worth checking what training you've got in place at present - at this level I think most would expect HACCP at Level 3/4, Food Hygiene at a similar level, VACCP/TACCP experience/familiarity, BRC experience/familiarity etc.
 

Thanks for your reply guys. I am not worried about moving as a QA assistant position and I would have to consider financial circumstances before deciding a pay cut on one level down.

The other question I will have if I decide to move as a QA supervisor or assistant then would that have an impact again getting into a QA manager position? What would be the right move from hygiene manager though? What can a hygiene manager move up in their career? 

Any advise and suggestions would be highly appreciated! TIA

Note: I do have BRC experience, retailer audit experience and got L3 - HACCP/Food Safety certifications done. 

I'd have thought that QA supervisor or similar would be a good option. It's a step down but allows you to go "sideways" into QA, and is then a logical step up to QA manager type roles, and should round out your CV quite nicely - at that point you'll have management level experience from the Hygiene Manager role, and QA experience too. In fact, on paper this should put you ahead of other candidates wanting to make a similar transition from QA supervisor to QA manager, as you've already got management experience.

And FWIW, the last QA manager that I hired had come from a QA supervisor role.

In general I'd always consider the potential necessity of taking one step down to move across to a new type of role or industry area - I've been a technical manager for the last eight years, but if I wanted to move into a completely different part of the food industry then I'd be reasonably accepting of the notion that I'd potentially have to take a step down to a less senior role in order to learn the ropes and, perhaps more importantly, to be able to demonstrate as much on my CV.