Head of Innovation Lab

About the role

The Head of Innovation Lab will design, lead and scale the Strategic Innovation Lab (SIL) for bpost, turning business challenges into measurable, high‑impact innovations. Reporting to senior leadership, you will ensure that the lab operates as a disciplined, business‑driven accelerator rather than a playground.

Key responsibilities

• Define the vision, positioning and operating model of the Strategic Innovation Lab.
• Translate strategic priorities into a structured innovation roadmap and portfolio.
• Manage a portfolio across incremental improvements, technology exploration & PoCs, and moonshot initiatives.
• Run time‑boxed experiments with clear hypotheses, success criteria and stop/scale/hand‑over decisions.
• Establish governance for resource prioritisation, progress tracking and risk mitigation.
• Build an innovation community and collaborate with business leaders to ensure shared accountability.
• Lead the full innovation lifecycle from discovery through validation and operational hand‑over.

Required profile

• Proven experience leading innovation functions, labs or similar initiatives.
• Strong business acumen with the ability to link innovation to measurable outcomes.
• Track record of delivering scalable solutions that create customer and business value.
• Excellent stakeholder management and ability to influence senior leaders.

Required skills