Head Of Footwear Creation Asia

In short

• At On, Swiss Engineering is our mindset. It’s a devotion to craft, performance, and quality that defines every product we make. As we scale globally, we are seeking a pivotal leader to embed this ethos directly at the source. As the Head of Footwear Creation, Asia, you will be the senior brand-side leader in Vietnam, entrusted to unify our creation teams and ensure every shoe that is created in our partner factories are a testament to our commitment to quality, excellence, craft and innovation.

Your Mission

• This role leads and mentors Asia-based creation teams across Inline Development, Engineering, and Testing, cultivating a high-performing culture rooted in collaboration, clarity, and executional excellence. It brings the precision and care of Swiss Engineering to the creation centres, ensuring our values are lived where the product becomes real.
• As the senior creation representative at source, this role partners closely with Sourcing and T1 creation teams to guide product execution through a brand and consumer lens. Together, these teams ensure that every product reflects On’s commitment to fit, finish, performance, and premium quality before scale.
• A core responsibility is to drive milestone readiness and sampling execution with speed and precision. By optimizing sample workflows, localized testing, and technical handovers, the role helps eliminate bottlenecks and raise the bar on consistency, craftsmanship, and quality.
• Acting as the conduit between Innovation and T1 partners, the role helps translate advanced (TRL8+) concepts into manufacturable, validated, and scalable solutions, applying engineering rigor and collaborative problem-solving to bridge concept and commercialization.
• The position plays a central role in implementing global, source-led initiatives such as factory direct development, speed-to-market workflows, and sample quality standardization. It also champions the ramp-up of 3D collaboration tools and digital creation systems that bring structure, visibility, and speed to the product lifecycle.
• With deep expertise in design-for-manufacturing and automation, this role helps design and creation teams understand how to design for scalable execution. Through the development of playbooks and toolkits, it enables smarter product and engineering choices, driving precision, repeatability, and creation integrity across the supplier network and aligning closely with Zurich teams.
• As a trusted counterpart to Sourcing and T1 leaders, this role ensures alignment without functional overlap, representing the voice of Product Creation, while supporting seamless execution through shared ownership and partnership.
• Responsibility for talent development, performance management, and cultural leadership sits at the core of this role, ensuring On’s values of care, craft, and ingenuity are reflected in how teams lead, collaborate, and bring products to life.
• Regular travel to Zurich is expected to ensure strategic alignment, maintain cross-regional cohesion, and contribute actively to global leadership and planning discussions, helping bring brand strategic choices and Swiss Engineering principles to life from concept to consumer.

Your story

• You are a seasoned footwear creation leader with over 15 years of experience in the industry, including a strong track record in senior roles close to manufacturing in Asia. Deeply technical and execution-focused, you bring end-to-end fluency across the footwear creation lifecycle, from upper and tooling engineering to pattern development, materials, construction methods, and quality standards, particularly in the performance segment.
• You are a strategic architect of process and scale. You understand the operating models required to build footwear of varying complexity and know how to deploy the right systems, capabilities, and tools, including PLM, 3D, and predictive testing to drive speed, consistency, and quality at scale.
• As an autonomous and inspiring leader, you combine strategic thinking with operational clarity. You plan effectively, lead with empathy, and create high-performing environments grounded in trust, accountability, and shared purpose.
• You thrive in complex ecosystems and know how to bring people together across geographies and cultures. Whether you're in the creation centre, factory floor or in a global leadership meeting, you act as a unifier and a strong advocate for the brand and its values.
• You are relentlessly focused on execution and problem-solving. You identify friction points, diagnose root causes, and implement durable solutions that improve performance across the value chain.
• Above all, you have a strong consumer and brand mindset. Every decision you make is rooted in delivering premium product quality and an exceptional end-user experience.

What to expect

We want to set everyone up for success, so here’s the lowdown on how we hire. Our process is a two-way street – bringing you into our culture, while helping us learn how you think.

Our full process can last about eight weeks from application to offer, because we care about getting it right. These steps explain how we usually do things.

Before you get started, feel free to consider if you want to work with us. Strange question? Well, we give people a lot of space to navigate their day-to-day and that style isn't for everyone. We want you to be passionate about what you do and be sure this is the right fit. Because when skills and passion combine – it creates that 'Wow' moment.

• Step One

  It starts with you...

  You'll start by submitting your application to a specific role. We try to keep this step as simple as possible. We do get a lot of applications, but we review them all. If you're a good fit to the role, a recruiter will follow up with you directly. If you didn't receive a reply, or were unsuccessful this time around, we encourage you to look for other possible matches at On.

• Step Two

  Interview with a recruiter

  What ignites your spirit? This is where we’ll start getting to know all about you and what makes you tick – and it’s your first chance to get a feel for our culture. Chatting with a member of our talent team, you’ll learn more about On and how we work. We’ll learn about what motivates you and what you could bring to the team.

• Step Three

  Interview with a hiring manager

  Ready to dig into the details? This second interview will be held with your future manager and will focus on the specifics of the job. Together you’ll delve into your unique skills and experiences and how they could be relevant at On. It's also a time to assess how you might feel working side-by-side. Bring any questions you have about the job, the team or anything else you might like to know – this is an open forum.

• Step Four

  The Case Study

  What's your style? This task will help us understand how you think, face a challenge and give insight into your novel ideas. Designed to give everyone their best shot, your case study is based on something you might typically experience on the job. This is your chance to show us what you’ve got. So express yourself. Be you.

• Step Five

  The Experience Day

  Your first taste of the Oniverse. This is a time to meet some of the people you'll be working closest with. In person or virtually, you'll get a feel for the day-to-day at On and the people who make it happen. You'll chat with a few potential teammates - the conversations will be as equally driven by the role and your experience as by our values. We believe how you do things is just as important as what you do.

• Step Six

  The Result

  Are we a good fit? We’ll get together internally to share our feedback and decide if we’re a match. We know that job searching is a big time investment, so it’s not a decision we take lightly. It’s also time for you to reflect on the experience – are we the right place for you? No matter the outcome, we’ll give you meaningful feedback.

Step One:

It starts with you...

You'll start by submitting your application to a specific role.

We try to keep this step as simple as possible. We do get a lot of applications, but we review them all. If you're a good fit to the role, a recruiter will follow up with you directly. If you didn't receive a reply, or were unsuccessful this time around, we encourage you to look for other possible matches at On.