Innovation Portfolio Lead: PM, Stage Gate & Alignment

Mezzetta; Larkspur (CA); On-site; USD 170,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Mezzetta is seeking a Senior Project Manager, Innovation to act as the operational backbone of its pre-launch portfolio. The role brings structure, clarity, and disciplined decision-making to a fast-paced, cross-functional environment within the innovation pipeline and stage gate process.

Reporting to the VP of Strategy & Execution, you will standardize project management practices, partner with functional leaders, and drive alignment, ensuring teams understand status, risks, and tradeoffs to

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree. MBA Preferred.
• PMP Certified Preferred.
• 10+ years of project management experience, with significant experience in CPG or food manufacturing preferred.
• Demonstrated success leading innovation pipelines and stage gate processes.
• Experience operating in ambiguous, fast changing environments with shifting priorities.
• Proven ability to drive cross-functional alignment and decision-making without direct authority.
• Strong ability to translate complexity into clear, actionable insights for leadership.
• Expertise in project management tools (Smartsheet preferred).
• Lean / Continuous Improvement experience (preferred).

Responsibilities

• Own and continuously improve Mezzetta’s innovation stage gate process.
• Ensure clear entry/exit criteria, decision frameworks, and accountability at each gate.
• Drive decision clarity and durability—minimizing rework and scope churn.
• Partner with Innovation, Marketing, R&D, and Operations to ensure feasibility, alignment, and execution readiness.
• Surface tradeoffs (cost, timing, complexity) to enable strong decision-making.
• Provide a clear, consolidated view of innovation project portfolio health.
• Translate complex project data into clear executive-level insights.
• Identify risks, dependencies, and capacity constraints early.
• Enable leadership to make informed decisions.
• Establish and enforce best practices, tools, and methodologies.
• Drive consistency in project scoping, planning, and execution.
• Train cross-functional teams on effective project management and stage gate discipline.
• Improve predictability, speed, and quality of project delivery.
• Drive accountability across teams for timelines, deliverables, and outcomes.
• Lead retrospectives and continuous improvement efforts.
• Optimize tools (e.g., Smartsheet) to support scalable execution, prioritization and resource decisions.

Skills

PMP Certified

Lean/CI

Cross-functional alignment

Decision making

Education

Bachelor’s Degree

MBA Preferred

Tools

Smartsheet

Job description

Mezzetta is seeking a Senior Project Manager, Innovation to act as the operational backbone of its pre-launch portfolio. The role brings structure, clarity, and disciplined decision-making to a fast-paced, cross-functional environment within the innovation pipeline and stage gate process.

Reporting to the VP of Strategy & Execution, you will standardize project management practices, partner with functional leaders, and drive alignment, ensuring teams understand status, risks, and tradeoffs to