Senior Scientist, Brita Water Filter R&D Product Development at Clorox in Pleasanton, CA - USA

Job description

• Clorox R&D turns consumer needs into trusted products that improve everyday life. In Brita, that work has a direct connection to people, water, and the planet—helping millions of consumers to access better-tasting water while reducing reliance on single-use bottles. As a Senior Scientist on the Brita R&D team, you will help shape the future of filtration by leading water filter product development and commercialization work across one of Clorox’s most recognized brands. This is a highly cross-functional, hands-on technical leadership role for someone who wants to combine science, consumer empathy, manufacturing partnership, and business impact.
• Brita’s mission is to enable better water for people and the planet. As a Senior Scientist in Brita R&D Product Development, you will lead complex and often ambiguous technical work focused on filtering innovation and commercialization across the Brita portfolio. You will serve as the technical lead for programs that span concept development, formulation/design, prototyping, testing, risk assessment, design for manufacturing, scale-up, and start-of-production. This role requires translating consumer needs, business priorities, technical feasibility, regulatory requirements, and manufacturing realities into robust product and process solutions in partnership with internal teams, external suppliers, plants, and manufacturing partners.
• This evergreen role is expected to build and apply deep Brita filtration expertise, influence cross-functional and leadership decisions, elevate technical best practices, and strengthen organizational capability through knowledge capture, training, and improved ways of working.
• This evergreen position will be in our Pleasanton, CA office, and the individual will be expected to be in the office for a minimum of 3 days a week. Relocation assistance will be offered.

Responsibilities

• In this role, you will provide senior-level technical leadership for Brita filter product development across the portfolio, with accountability for complex initiatives that influence the broader Brita business:
• Own Filtration Product Development and Scale-Up: Develop and refine filter formulations, product specifications, process parameters, and performance requirements through lab experimentation, pilot trials, and full-scale manufacturing. Apply strong technical judgment, structured problem solving, statistical analysis, and design-of-experiment approaches to deliver consumer delight, product quality, manufacturability, and supply continuity.
• Lead Complex Technical Programs: Identify, lead, and execute new product development and technical initiatives were consumer metrics, formulation/design, process, supplier capability, or manufacturing location may be undefined. Bring clarity to ambiguity, shape technical plans, and drive decisions that advance Brita business priorities.
• Lead Cross-Functional Technical Decisions: Serve as the R&D technical lead and “one R&D voice” across Marketing, Insights, Design, Sales, Supply Chain, Quality, Regulatory, Legal, project teams, suppliers, plants, and external manufacturers. Translate consumer, business, regulatory, quality, manufacturing, and cost needs into technical requirements, specifications, claims support, risk assessments, and commercialization-ready decisions that balance impact, speed, feasibility, and execution risk.
• Drive External Partner and Manufacturing Excellence: Partner effectively with external filtration technology suppliers, domestic and international manufacturers, and Clorox plants to ensure technical requirements, quality expectations, regulatory needs, and commercial launch requirements are met.
• Elevate Best Practices and Capability: Create, approve, and educate teams on product development, test method, specification, risk assessment, trial, and commercialization best practices. Capture technical learning, train others on Brita filtration technologies, and strengthen the broader department’s ability to deliver with speed and rigor.
• Champion Digital, Data, and AI-Enabled R&D: Use digital tools, data analysis, models, and emerging AI-enabled ways of working to improve speed, quality of decisions, technical learning, knowledge management, and delivery of R&D work outputs.
• Provide organizational leadership beyond project work through mentoring, recruiting support, communities of practice, training, and knowledge sharing.
• Travel up to approximately 25% to suppliers, plants, and manufacturing partners, including international travel.

Requirements

• 5+ years of R&D, product development, product design, process development, formulation, materials, chemistry, water treatment technology, filtration, analytical chemistry, manufacturing scale-up, or related technical experience.
• Product development, product design, commercialization, or technology development experience is strongly preferred. Please see the next bullet points for more details.
• Highly relevant experience may come from consumer products, food and beverage, beverage systems or appliances, medical filtration device/medtech, diagnostics, applied biotech, water treatment technologies, filtration media, specialty chemicals/materials, regulated products, manufacturing scale-up, supplier technical management, or adjacent technical industries—especially where the candidate has led product design, product development, verification/validation, commercialization, or technology transfer work.
• Knowledge of drinking water, filtration, or treatment standards and certification pathways is preferred, including familiarity with EPA water requirements, NSF/ANSI test methods or standards, and third-party certification processes. Direct filtration or consumer products experience is preferred but not required if the candidate brings strong technical depth, product development orientation, and relevant transferable experience.
• Skills and Abilities
• Demonstrated ability to lead undefined, complex technical work and bring clarity to ambiguous product, process, supplier, or manufacturing challenges.
• Strong technical judgment with hands-on testing, methodical problem solving, data analysis, statistics, DOE, tolerance assessment, capability analysis, and sample-size rationale.
• Ability to translate consumer needs, business priorities, claims, regulatory requirements, quality expectations, and manufacturing constraints into technical specifications and execution plans.
• Ability to influence cross-functional stakeholders, leadership teams, suppliers, and manufacturing partners through clear technical recommendations and risk-based decision making.
• Experience developing or improving best practices, test methods, technical standards, knowledge capture, training, or capability-building approaches for a broader technical team.
• Ability to leverage digital tools, data analysis, models, and AI-enabled ways of working to improve speed, learning, documentation, and quality of technical decisions.
• Strong communication, organization, learning agility, and ownership mindset; able to work independently and cross-functionally with minimal supervision in a fast-paced environment.
• Minimum bachelor's degree in chemical engineering, Environmental Engineering, Materials Science/Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, or a related technical field; equivalent relevant experience may be considered.
• Also pursuing advanced degrees (M.S. or Ph.D.) in Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Materials Science/Engineering, Polymer Science, Water Resources Engineering, or a related discipline, particularly with experience in water treatment/chemistries or filtration/media is an advantage.

Skills

Required

• Strong communication
• organization
• learning agility
• ownership mindset
• data analysis
• statistics
• DOE
• tolerance assessment
• capability analysis
• sample-size rationale
• digital tools
• AI-enabled ways of working

Benefits

• At Clorox, we champion people to be well and thrive, starting with our own people. To help make this possible, we offer comprehensive, competitive benefits that prioritize all aspects of wellbeing and provide flexibility for our teammates’ unique needs. This includes robust health plans, a market-leading 401(k) program with a company match, flexible time off benefits (including half-day summer Fridays depending on location), inclusive fertility/adoption benefits, and more.
• We are committed to fair and equitable pay and are transparent with current and future teammates about our full salary ranges. We use broad salary ranges that reflect the competitive market for similar jobs, provide sufficient opportunity for growth as you gain experience and expand responsibilities, while also allowing for differentiation based on performance. Based on the breadth of our ranges, most new hires will start at Clorox in the first half of the applicable range. Your starting pay will depend on job-related factors, including relevant skills, knowledge, experience and location. The applicable salary range for every role in the U.S. is based on your work location and is aligned to one of three zones according to the cost of labor in your area.
• -
• –Zone A: $109,400 - $210,000
• –Zone B: $100,300 - $192,500
• –Zone C: $91,200 - $175,000
• All ranges are subject to change in the future. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your location during the hiring process.
• This job is also eligible for participation in Clorox’s incentive plans, subject to the terms of the applicable plan documents and policies.