Industrial Design Manager, Trends & CMF (Color, Finish & Materials)

Fortune Brands Innovations, Inc. is an industry-leading home, security and digital products company. We’re focused on exciting opportunities within the home, security and commercial building markets. Our driving purpose is to elevate every life by transforming spaces into havens. We believe our work and our brands can have incredibly positive impacts for not just our business and shareholders, but for people and the planet, too.

At Fortune Brands, we’re building something big. We’re advancing exciting innovations in all of our products and processes. We’re delivering trust, dependability, sustainability, and style. To make it all happen, we’ve transformed our workplace into an environment where smart, ambitious people have the support to reach their fullest potential.

When you join Fortune Brands, you become part of a high-performing team empowered to think big, learn fast and make bold decisions. We support an inclusive culture where everyone is encouraged be their authentic selves, and where our differences and unique perspectives are a key strength.

Explore life at Fortune Brands here.

As the Industrial Design Manager, Trends & CMF (Color, Finish & Materials), you will inspire and partner with a world-class industrial design team that shapes thoughtful, meaningful product experiences across the brand. This role focuses on inspiring a creative team, supporting effective execution, and evolving the practice of Trends forecasting and execution to inform both future and short term growth.

We’re looking for someone who brings expertise in Design Strategy, Trends and Color, Finish and Material, a strong understanding of industrial design, and the ability to create and enhance the emotional connection between physical products and user experiences. This person will support cross-functional collaboration, uplift team members, and contribute to the company’s long-term design strategy through vision, empathy, adaptability, and clear communication.

We value individuals who can Think Fast by integrating trends and CMF with business strategy and leveraging technology to enhance creativity and accelerate impact; Work It Together by building trust-based relationships across cross-functional teams to ensure alignment on roadmaps and innovation pipelines; and Make the Hard Call by confidently navigating ambiguity, prioritizing work with clarity, and balancing forward looking design with execution realities.

What you will be doing

Team Development

• Inspire and inform worldclass industrial design team.
• Foster a culture infused with creativity

Design & Project Leadership

• Lead the Trend Strategy and Color, Finish, Materials application to our portfolio of brands.
• Spot emergent design trends and work cross functionally to size cultural themes.
• Contextualize macro trends and scale relevant to FBIN products. Define inspiration and any relevant guardrails.
• Inspire design strategy balancing short term initiavies with future forward strategies and execution across kitchen, bath showering environments and accessories.
• Deliver elevated product and experience design that advances brand relevance and business growth.
• Spot blindspots in Trend strategies and define solutions to address.
• Develop design documentation to support new products.
• Defines, documents and developes technically feasible, elevated CMF across ID projects.
• Manages CMF database and CMF finish library.
• Work It Together with the Industrial Design Team to align on emerging initiatives and concept development.
• Directly lead key initiatives, managing internal and external resources to deliver compelling solutions.

Process & Capability Development

• Establish and evolve best-in-class trend forecasting processes, methods, and tools.
• Advance adoption of Trend and Color Finish, Materials methodologies User-Centered Design, and Design Thinking.
• Translate Annual Design Trend Strategy macro level insights to design application.
• Embrace and implement new technologies including AI-augmented design tools and emerging platforms.
• Lead by example in technical tools including Adobe Creative Cloud, Keyshot, VizCom and VR environments.
• Encourage skillsets that blend technical craft with empathy, creativity, and strategic collaboration.

• Bachelor’s degree in CMF, Industrial Design or a related field.
• 10+ years of experience in industrial design, with a strong portfolio of consumer or interior goods.
• Solid knowledge of global design trends in architecture and interior design with proven ability to translate and communicate actionable recommendations.
• Ability to take macros trends and translate to product solutions that enhance the overall emotional conection with the user.
• Confident speaking to and presenting trend strategies to internal cross functional teams and external media.
• Experience taking physical products from concept to launch preferably including connected or digitally enabled products.
• Proficient in design tools like Keyshot, Adobe Creative Cloud, and familiar with VR/AR or AI-enhanced design tools.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS:

• 5+ years leading and mentoring design teams.
• Experience working for fashion, interior, architecture, home or connected products.
• Experience in plastics, metal manufacturing and finishing.
• Knowledge of design systems, visual brand language, and working across multiple brands.

Fortune Brands believes in fair and equitable pay. A reasonable estimate of the base salary range for this role is Hiring Pay Range: $105,000 USD - $165,000 USD. Please note that actual salaries may vary within the range, or be above or below the range, based on factors including, but not limited to, education, training, experience, professional achievement, business need, and location. In addition to base salary, employees will participate in either an annual bonus plan based on company and individual performance, or a role-based sales incentive plan.

At Fortune Brands, we support the overall health and wellness of our associates by offering 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 contribution, product discounts, flexible time off benefits, adoption benefits, and more. We offer numerous ERGs (Employee Resource Groups) to foster a sense of belonging for all associates.

Fortune Brands is built on industry-leading brands and innovation within the high-growth categories of water, outdoors and security. The Company makes innovative products for residential and commercial environments, with a growing focus on digital solutions and products that add luxury, contribute to safety and enhance sustainability. To learn more, visit our website at fbin.com.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Fortune Brands is an equal opportunity employer. Fortune Brands evaluates qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, gender identity or expression, national origin, ancestry, age, disability/handicap status, marital status, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, genetic history or information, or any other legally protected characteristic.

Reasonable Accommodations

Fortune Brands is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If, because of a medical condition or disability, you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application or interview process, please contact us at [email protected] and let us know the nature of your request along with your contact information.

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To protect yourself from fraudulent job postings or recruitment scams, please note that Fortune Brands job postings are exclusively hosted on our website at fbin.com/careers via our SmartRecruiters platform. Fortune Brands will never request banking information or sensitive personal details until an offer of employment has been accepted and the onboarding process begins.