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Global Product Sustainability Lead

Emerson United States Added on Sep 3, 2026
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As a key leader within Emerson’s global operations, you will take ownership of the transition toward circular product design and low-carbon engineering. This role involves orchestrating the end-to-end lifecycle assessment strategy, from setting the data architecture for carbon footprinting to collaborating with procurement on sustainable raw materials. You will act as the technical bridge between high-level sustainability goals and practical engineering execution across diverse business units.

This role is pivotal because it addresses the core environmental impact of industrial automation: the physical hardware itself. By embedding sustainability into the early design and packaging stages, you directly influence the Scope 3 emissions of both Emerson and its global client base. It is a rare opportunity to drive systemic change within a massive manufacturing footprint, ensuring that complex machinery is built for a resource-constrained future.

This suits someone who possesses a strong engineering or materials science background and excels at navigating large, matrixed organizations. You should be a data-driven strategist who can turn complex life cycle assessments into actionable business roadmaps.

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What are the main missions and responsibilities of this role?

The primary mission is to steer Emerson’s sustainable product and packaging design strategy, ensuring that environmental considerations are integrated into the earliest stages of the product development lifecycle. You will lead the adoption of circularity principles and work closely with environmental compliance teams to align design guidelines with emerging global regulations. You will also oversee the central team responsible for Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) analyses. This involves refining internal methodologies, streamlining data workflows, and collaborating with IT to build a scalable data architecture that can handle the complexity of a global manufacturing portfolio.

Key learning opportunities for this job

This role offers deep exposure to cutting-edge Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) tools and methodologies at an enterprise scale. You will gain unique insights into how large-scale industrial automation companies manage digital transformation in the context of sustainability data, providing a masterclass in data governance and carbon accounting. Furthermore, you will have the chance to engage with external industry forums and expert partners, keeping you at the forefront of regulatory trends like the Digital Product Passport or evolving PCR standards. This provides a rare platform to influence industry-wide best practices for industrial sustainability.

How does the ideal candidate look like (experience, skills)?

The ideal candidate brings 5 to 7 years of experience in product design or management, backed by a technical degree in engineering or materials science. Expertise in LCA methodologies and PCF tools is essential, as the role requires a high degree of technical credibility when speaking to engineering and supply chain teams. Soft skills are just as critical; you must be an influential communicator capable of translating complex environmental data into a compelling business case. Experience in the industrial automation sector is a significant plus, as is a proven track record of managing cross-functional projects in a global matrix environment.

Advice to stand out and make a successful application

To stand out, emphasize your experience in bridging the gap between technical LCA data and strategic business decisions. Provide concrete examples of where you successfully influenced product teams to change materials or designs based on environmental impact assessments, rather than just reporting the data. Tailor your application to show a deep understanding of Emerson’s specific challenges in automation machinery, such as the carbon intensity of steel, electronics, and plastics. Demonstrating an ability to navigate complex IT landscapes for data collection will also highlight your readiness for their global scaling objectives.

What aspects of the company's sustainability is this role likely to focus on?

The role focuses heavily on circularity and decarbonization within the product portfolio. You will be the architect of how Emerson measures and reduces the impact of its physical goods, directly tackling the challenges of Scope 3 upstream and downstream emissions through smarter material choices and packaging. You will also play a key role in responsible sourcing. By collaborating with procurement teams, you will help create decarbonization roadmaps for high-impact commodities like aluminum and castings, ensuring that sustainability is a core metric in supplier selection and logistics strategy.

What are the main challenges someone in this role might face?

A primary challenge will be data fragmentation across different business units and global regions. Harmonizing methodologies and ensuring data quality for PCF calculations in a company with over 50,000 employees requires significant persistence and technical rigor. Another obstacle is cultural alignment. Shifting established engineering mindsets toward circularity can be difficult in a sector traditionally focused on performance and cost. You will need to balance sustainability goals with operational efficiency to ensure long-term buy-in from various business unit leaders.

How could a typical day look like for someone in this position?

A typical day might begin with a review of carbon footprint data with the central technical team, followed by a meeting with IT to discuss the integration of sustainability metrics into the enterprise data architecture. You might then shift to a strategic session with a business unit to prioritize a design-for-sustainability pilot project. Afternoons are often spent in cross-functional collaboration, perhaps working with the responsible sourcing team on supplier data collection or training sales teams on how to communicate product sustainability benefits to customers. The day likely ends with research into new regulatory requirements or industry trends.

What are the opportunities for professional growth and development in this role?

Given the global scope and strategic importance of this role, it offers a clear path toward Executive sustainability leadership. Successfully scaling a product carbon footprint program across a company of Emerson’s size is a major career milestone that builds high visibility with senior management. There are also opportunities for lateral growth into strategic product management or global supply chain leadership, as the skills gained in sustainable design and data governance are increasingly central to all core business functions in the industrial sector.

The main stakeholders you might be interacting with

You will interact extensively with engineering and product development teams to drive the implementation of eco-design guidelines. Close collaboration with the IT and Data Governance departments is also essential to build the systems necessary for scalable sustainability reporting. Externally, you will engage with suppliers and industry partners to improve primary data collection and stay aligned with best practices. You will also support sales and marketing teams by providing the technical evidence they need to meet customer demands for low-carbon automation solutions.

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